Hymnody past and present [microform]

Cibc ^Iniversitv of Cb
1C ib retries

HYMNODY
PAST AND PRESENT

By the same Author :

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HYMNODY
PAST AND PRESENT

BY

C. S. PHILLIPS

M.A., D.D.

CHAPLAIN OF THE COLLEGE OF ST. NICOLAS,

CHISLEHURST

FORMERLY FELLOW. AND LECTURER OF SELWYN
COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

LONDON

SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING
CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE

NEW YORK : THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

.f 56

Krsf published, 1937

LIEI?
^ "-, " "

MADE IN GREAT BRITAIN

1284089

W. F.

MAGISTRO
DISCIPVLVS

PREFACE

THE subject of Christian hymnody is so vast that any
attempt to deal with it (as here) in a popular, practical
and succinct way must necessarily approach it from a
particular angle. It should therefore be made clear
that the present book treats of it with special reference
to the hymns of all ages and countries that are in use
among English (and, more particularly, Anglican)
Christians to-day. ;

Within these limits the book aims at setting before the
general reader the main results of scholarly research
on the subject with which it deals. Its author can
make no claim to be a researcher at first hand himself.
But he has for many years taken a warm interest in the
history and the use of hymns : and he has done his best to
equip himself for his task by a diligent study of the best
and latest authorities on its subj eel-matter, both English
and foreign. The notes containing his references to these
have been relegated to the end of the volume, so that the
ordinary reader need not be distracted by them ; while at
the same time those who would go deeper into the subject
are given assistance towards doing so. The works to which
he is chiefly indebted are set forth at the head of the notes
in question : and to their writers, living and dead, the
author here makes the grateful acknowledgments that are
fitting.

So far as individual hymns are concerned, the book
takes as its basis the three hymn-books which at the
present time are in most general use in the Church of
England, viz. Hymns Ancient and Modern, the English Hymnal

vii

PREFACE

and Songs of Praise, together with the recently published
Plainsong Hymn Book. These are on occasion referred to for
brevity's sake as A.M., E.H., S.P. andP.H.B. respectively.
In the case of hymn-numbers * denotes Hymns Ancient and
Modern, ** the Plainsong Hymn Book, | the English Hymnal
and J Songs of Praise. It may be added that up to the
end of chapter iv references to Songs of Praise have not
been inserted, for the reason that such of the famous
hymns of earlier ages as appear in that book have in
certain cases been so altered that the versions can hardly
be said to represent the originals.

COLLEGE OF ST. NICOLAS,
CHISLEHURST,

Eastertide, 1937.

Vlll

CONTENTS

PAGE
Preface vii

Introduction. Concerning Hymns in general . i

PART I. HISTORICAL

Chap. I. The Early Church . . .11

II. Hymns of the Eastern Church . 27

III. Latin Hymnody .... 47

IV. Latin Hymnody (continued] . . 68

V. German Hymnody . . -99

VI. The Metrical Psalters . . .123

VII. English Hymnody up to the time of

Watts 148

VIII. The Methodist and Evangelical Move-
ments . . . . 171

IX. The Oxford Movement and After . 198
X. New Ideas in the Twentieth Century 229

PART II. PRACTICAL

XI. Towards a Policy . . . -249

XII. Some Practical Counsels . / . . 260

Notes ........ 271

ix

CONTENTS
PART III. APPENDICES

PAGE

Appendix A. A brief note on Hymn-metres . 279

B. A Table to illustrate the Develop-
ment of the Hymnal Scheme of
the English Mediaeval Breviaries . 281

G. Office Hymns from "Neo-Gallican"

Breviaries .... 286

D. English Hymns in common use

based on the Psalms . . .289

Index of Subj eels . . . . . .291

\
Index of Hymn-titles (English) .... 297

INTRODUCTION

Concerning Hymns in general

" There is a style and manner suited to the composition of
hymns which may be more successfully or at least more easily
attained by a versifier than by a poet. They should be Hymns,
not Odes, if designed for public worship and for the use of
plain people. Perspicacity, simplicity and ease should be
chiefly attended to : and the image and colouring of poetry,
if admitted at all, should be indulged sparingly and with
great judgment. The late Dr. Watts, many of whose hymns
are admirable patterns in this species of writing, might, as a
poet, have a right to say that it cost him labour to restrain
his fire and to accommodate himself to the capacity of
common readers."

So wrote Gowper's friend, the Reverend John Newton, in
his preface to the Olney Hymns, dated Feb. 15, 1779. His
explanations were, by his own admission, largely made in
self-defence to meet the possible charge that, unlike Dr.
Watts, he was not a poet. But it is interesting to note that,
over a century later, his view was echoed from the
opposite side, so to speak by one whose poetic qualifica-
tion even his most carping critic will not seriously deny.
Not long before his death, Tennyson, in a conversation
with Dr. Warren, President of Magdalen, remarked : "A
good hymn is the most difficult thing in the world to write.
In a good hymn you have to be commonplace and poetical.
The moment you cease to be commonplace and put in any
expression at all out of the common, it ceases to be a
hymn."i

The two judgments recorded above will help to make
clear the scope of the present book. It is a book on hymns,
not on religious poetry. Many of the greatest examples of
the poetic faculty at work on the loftiest subject of all will

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

find no place in its pages for the simple reason that,
though poetry, they are not hymns. On the other hand,
the great bulk of the compositions that do concern us are
hardly more than verse, and sometimes not even very
good verse. They may have the appeal that comes from
the sincere expression of deeply felt emotion : but the high
imaginative flight that makes great poetry is not theirs
and indeed they would be less suited for their purpose if it
were. No hymn that has attained to world-wide fame and
popularity bears the name of any poet of the first rank.
The hymns that are classics in their own line are the work
of men who have been notable for their piety rather than
for their literary accomplishment. It may occasionally
happen that a hymn-writer includes in his make-up a
spark of the genuine poetic fire. This is specially true of
one whom some would place at the head of all English
hymn-writers Charles Wesley. But even in his case the
poetic inspiration was very uncertain and spasmodic : and
if his countless hymns sometimes contain real poetry it is
more by accident than by design, for his aim was not
literature but edification. When he showed himself a poet,
it was simply because he could not help it.

What then is a hymn in the sense, that is, in which
we are mainly concerned with such things in the pages
that follow ?

Two elements in the required definition are. too obvious
to need much comment. First, a hymn is concerned with
the expression of religious feeling of some kind. St.
Augustine's definition hymnus cantus est cum laude Dei,
"a hymn is a song with praise of GOD" 2 is clearly too
much restricted, at least for modern usage : for hymns ex-
press many other moods of the soul besides praise. But
whatever it be, the feeling expressed must be of a religious
character : arid (seeing that our subjeclis Christian hymns)
it must also be consonant with the kind of religious outlook
associated with the Christian faith and pradice.

2

INTRODUCTION

Secondly, a hymn should be cast in a metrical or at
least a rhythmic form. Prose passages may sometimes be
described as "hymns", as e.g. when St. Paul's great out-
pouring in i Cor. xiii. is called "a hymn in praise of love":
but with such we cannot concern ourselves here.. The
rhythmic structure of a hymn need not be cast in the strict
mould of formal prosody, though in modern hymns it
practically always is. But some rhythmic basis there must
be, in a hymn as in a poem.

To this extent, then, a hymn is the same as a religious
poem. But we have already seen that for our present pur-
pose the two need to be differentiated. This differentiation
may be made (as Newton suggested) along two lines.

i. First, a hymn is a religious poem that is "designed
for public worship". This naturally includes the idea of its
being sung to a musical setting. As St. Augustine says, a
hymn is a "song" we may add, a communal song. Even
those who do not actually join in singing it are regarded
as associating themselves in mind and heart with what the
singers sing for them. So, too, even those religious bodies
which have been most hostile to the use of music in
worship have made an exception in the case of hymns, or
at least of metrical versions of the Biblical psalms. Thus
the present book, while mainly concerned with the words
of hymns, will hardly be able to avoid some consideration
of the tunes to which they are set. It must be remarked,
however, that when we speak of a hymn as "designed for
public worship", we mean "designed" only in the sense of
"adapted" not necessarily that it was written, at least
primarily, for such a purpose. The Jewish Psalter, in the
form in which we have it, is a collection of sacred lyrics for
liturgical use "the hymn-book of the Second Temple",
it has been called. But this does not mean that all the
psalms that compose it, or indeed more than a minority,
were written with a view to such use. Many of the most
beautiful and poignant of them are obviously the expres-

3

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

sion of some intensely personal and individual emotion,
written in an innermost chamber for no human eye save
the writer's. "In the Psalms", says Dean Church, "we see
the soul in the secret of its workings loving, hoping,
fearing, despairing, exulting, repenting, aspiring". 3

But such emotions are, in a greater or less degree, the
common property of mankind ; though only a few can give
them adequate verbal expression. Thus it was only natural
that these classic voicings of a universal experience should
be laid hold of eagerly by those who could feel, but could
not utter their feeling : and, inasmuch as the emotions in
question are the stuff and staple of man's religious life,
that these psalms, originally written by one man for him-
self, should become part of the public worship of the
Jewish and afterwards of the Christian Church. In the
same way many of the most famous hymns were written
to express the writer's religious mood of the moment : .and
indeed to not a few of them are attached stories, true or
legendary, concerning the circumstances that inspired
them. It would be too much to say that there was never an
idea in the writer's mind of their being sung in public : for
the individualistic type of religion fostered e.g. by the
Methodist and Evangelical Revivals favoured this per-
sonal type of hymn. But before such lyrics can come pro-
perly within the category of "hymns", they must have
proved in practice their suitability for communal use.

The case is otherwise, of course, with hymns specifically
written for use in public worship : but, rather oddly, the
most popular hymns are not usually of this type, nor are
they very easy in any case to find in large numbers. It is a
valid criticism of most hymn-books that "I" hymns are
far too numerous. But the fault is less that of the compilers
than of those who write and (still more) of those who sing
hymns.

2. Secondly, a hymn (at least if it is to be of practical
value) must be "designed for the use of plain people".

4

INTRODUCTION

It would be too much to say that this description is applic-
able without exception to all the hymns of which we are
to speak. The later Greek hymns were highly elaborate
compositions designed for the edification of a religious
elite rather than of the multitude. Again, in the West, as
the languages of modern Europe developed and Latin
ceased to be in common use, the Office Hymns and
Sequences can have conveyed little to the ordinary wor-
shipper, who even in the Middle Ages successfully vindi-
cated his right (though within strict limits) to express his
devotion in vernacular canticles that he could understand.
But so far as our own current use of hymns is concerned,
the need of simplicity and general intelligibility cannot be
ignored. The Christian Church is a democratic body in
which the "foolish" are of not less account than the
"wise". The former, too, are by far the more numerous.
As .Dr. Neale says, "Church hymns must be the life-
expression of all hearts." 4 The desire of our reformers to
raise the level of the hymns we sing is a very laudable one :
and it is obvious that we must be exceedingly chary about
introducing into our hymn-books material that we know
to be of slight literary or musical value simply because it
is popular. It may also be conceded that as education ad-
vances even an average congregation may come to enjoy
singing hymns of a poetic quality that is at present "above
their heads". But a hymn-book that is nothing more than
an anthology of religious poetry wedded to tunes in an
elaborate and unfamiliar idiom defeats its own ends. The
ideal hymn is harmonious and dignified in its language
and moves gracefully in its prosody : but it is at the same
time simple and free from all elaboration both of thought
and expression such a hymn as 'O GOD, our help in
ages past.' Here we have no word or image that even the
simplest can fail to understand. Yet the total effe6l is of a
sober magnificence that makes the hymn worthy of the
greatest and most moving occasions.

5

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

It is important, too, that not only the language and
imagery of a hymn but also its sentiment should be suited
to the ordinary worshipper. Nothing is more pernicious
than to put on the lips of people phrases that they do not
and cannot mean. It is a real objection to many Victorian
hymns and even more to many of the hymns of the
Methodist Revival that they express sentiments which,
however sincere in those who wrote them, are not sincere
when voiced secondhand by the ordinary Churchgoer.
But the same objection applies to many religious poems
which some would substitute for the "old favourites".
Emily Bronte's superb 'No coward soul is mine' is just as
inappropriate to the average "man in the pew" as 'O
Paradise, O Paradise' : and the argument against its use
as a hymn cannot be evaded by pleading its literary excel-
lence. It is possible to make out a case for a sparing use of
such things on the ground that they provide people with
an ideal to aim at or at least to admire. But we must
always be on our guard against the insincerity which is
the greatest enemy of real religion.

At the same time it should not be forgotten that even
"ordinary" people vary widely in their temperament and
circumstances, and also that every individual may at
times have to pass through experiences that set him apart
from the mass of his fellows. For example, hymns in pre-
paration for death may be very unreal on the lips of the
young and healthy. Yet there are circumstances in which
such hymns may be most appropriate, both for communal
and even more for private use. To old people who have
been confined to the house for years their hymn-book may
mean a great deal ; for it is usually the only book of sacred
verse which they possess. Again, it is not unusual to hear a
hymn like Bonar's 'Thy way, not mine, O Lord' con-
demned as "defeatist". Yet, after all, it reflects the earthly
lot of a large number of our fellow human-beings, and
when sung by a gathering of tired and worn working-class

6

INTRODUCTION

mothers may have an intense pathos. If, however, hymns
with a particular appeal of this kind are included in a
hymnal, the preface should make it clear that its contents
are not all suitable for use at the ordinary Sunday
services.

A word may be added here concerning the scope and
purpose of the present book. Its treatment of its subjects is
primarily historical, seeking to give an account of the de-
velopment of Christian hymnody throughout the ages
not, of course, a complete account, but one that keeps
specially in view those writers and those hymns of all
periods which figure in the hymnals in use among
English Ghurchpeople (and, indeed, in those of English
Christians generally) to-day. Even so, the field is so
enormous that we shall often be compelled to confine
ourselves to the best-known names in the various depart-
ments of our study and to their most conspicuous
productions. But it is hoped that the reader will at least
obtain a general conspectus of a large subject which
will help him to a more intelligent and interested
participation in the hymns that he sings.

This, however, is not all. Our aim is in part practical
not only to inform but also to guide. Of all the parts of
Christian worship the hymns make the widest popular
appeal. But for that very reason it is important that we
should give careful attention to the question of the hymns
that we are to use. We shall deal with this question further
at the end of the book. For the present it is sufficient to
point out that it can only be dealt with properly against a
background of knowledge knowledge, first, of the
history and range of Christian hymnody and, secondly,
of the criteria that should be applied in judging individual
hymns. It is the author's modest hope that he may do a
little to help his readers to better their equipment in both
directions.

7

PART I
HISTORICAL

CHAPTER I
THE EARLY CHURCH

IN every race and age religious emotion has found
utterance in music and song. This was even more than
usually to be expected in the case of a religion so en-
thusiastic, and often even ecstatic, as we know the Christi-
anity of the first age to have been. As Dr. Frere has said,
"The Christian Church started on its way singing." 5 But
when we go on/to ask what actually were the songs it sang,
we confront a question to which it is not easy to give a
satisfactory answer.

i

On one point at least we may speak with assurance. St.
Paul in a well-known passage bids the Ephesians "speak
to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs"
(Eph. v. 19 ; cf. Col. iii. 16). It is natural to assume that
on the lips of a Jew the word "psalms" bears its customary
meaning ; though it would hardly be safe to treat this as
certain. But at least there can be no doubt as to the promi-
nent and indeed primary place which the Jewish psalter
held in the song of the youthful Church, as in that of all
Christian ages since. That Church had its roots deep in
the Jewish past from which it arose : and along with the
other Scriptures of the Old Covenant it took over its sacred
song as well. To the first disciples, as to their Master, the
Psalms were a treasure of inestimable worth that was
known by heart. No doubt He and they would often repeat
them together : and the "hymn" which they sang before
leaving the Upper Chamber for Gethsemane (St. Mark
xiv. 26) was almost certainly the Hallel, consisting of

ii

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Pss. cxii.-cxviii. The Psalms, too, formed an integral part of
the worship of those synagogues of the Diaspora through
which the Gospel was first spread outside Palestine. Thus
through the Christians of Jewish race they would become
known (in the Greek translations) to their fellows who -
were drawn from among the Gentiles : and when, in conse-
quence of the split between the Church and the Syna-
gogue, the former began to organize a worship entirely its
own, it was in the Psalms that the faith and devotion of its
members continued to find expression. So, too, at a later
date, the due recitation of the Psalter was one of the two
main objects with which the "Divine Office" came into
existence, the other being the regular reading of Holy
Scripture. 6

It would appear, further, that along with the words of
the Psalms the Christian Church took over from the
Jewish the manner of their musical performance. The
origin of the ancient music of the Church called "plain-
song" is a question of extreme obscurity : and our present
state of knowledge does not allow us to say with certainty
whether or not it is ultimately derived from the "cantilla-
tion" practised in the Temple and synagogues. But how-
ever it may be with the music itself, there is no doubt
that both the earlier and the later methods of chanting the
psalms practised in the Christian Church had Jewish ante-
cedents. 7 The former method is called "responsorial" and
consists of a solo recitation by the precentor interspersed
with occasional responses by the choir or congregation.
The latter, the "antiphonal" method (traditionally said to
have been originated by St. Ignatius at Antioch, but more
probably introduced there in the fourth century and
thence rapidly extended over both East and West), con-
sists in the chanting of the verses by two choirs alternately.
Both these types of psalmody were pradised by the Jews
indeed, the structure of some of the psalms clearly pre-
supposes the one or the other.

12

THE EARLY CHURCH

The Jewish antecedents of Christianity are nowhere
more in evidence than in the earliest of its sacred lyrics
those to be found in the opening chapters of St. Luke's
Gospel. These ("the Messianic Psalms of the New
Testament," as they have been called) viz. the Magnificat,
Benediftus and Nunc dimittis partake of the strongly
Hebraic character of the whole Gospel of the Infancy in
which they are embedded. The Magnificat bears a close
resemblance to the Song of Hannah in i Sam. i. : and they
may all have been originally composed in Aramaic. But
they stand by themselves ; and, in literary form at least,
represent rather the close of an old era than the beginning
of a new. ' It is possible that the Jewish-Christiarfcom-
munities of Palestine had their religious lyrics similarly
framed on the model of the Jewish. Psalms. But as the
main current of the Christian propaganda advanced into
the world of the Mediterranean, it moved further away
from its Hebrew origins and became more and more im-
pregnated with Hellenic elements. Thus it would be only
natural that the sacred song of the Gentile churches should
reflect this development. Yet even so the Biblical influence
was unescapable: and, here most of all, the Oriental
element would seem to have always dominated the Greek.
It is true that the old Hellenic religion had its "hymns"
no less than the religion of Israel. The. so-called "Hymns
of Homer" were already old in the time of Thucydides :
and later centuries witnessed the production of the Hymns
of Callimachus (III rd century B.C.), the famous Hymn to
%eus of the Stoic Cleanthes (quoted by St. Paul on Mars'
Hill) as well as the hymns associated with the Orphic
mysteries. But we have no reason to suppose that these
products of Paganism had any influence on the hymnody
of the Christian Church. It is possible, again, that the
Graeco-Asiatic mystery-religions that were so widespread
and so influential in the Roman Empire during the first
centuries of Christianity may have affected its sacred song,

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

as well as other departments of its life. But we have no
material evidence of this : and in any case the character of
these religions was rather Oriental than Greek. As Lord
Selborne said, "For the origin and idea of Christian
hymnody we must look, not to Gentile, but to Hebrew'
sources." 8 Yet a religion possessed by so furious a vitality
as was primitive Christianity was bound to find fresh
modes of expression for its love and worship, and, what-
ever its debt to the old, to blossom forth also into the new.

ii

Of what nature then were the "hymns and spiritual
songs" of which St. Paul speaks the songs which the
Church used in addition to the psalms bequeathed to it
by Israel and which expressed its new environment and
outlook ? Here we are largely in the region of surmise.
The Church quickly began to create for itself a new
authoritative literature of its own, by the side of what it
had inherited from Judaism. But in this literature as we
possess it poetry is not included, except in an indirect and
incidental way. However, it seems not impossible to
extraft a certain amount of material on which conjecture
may be based.

It may be well at the outset to warn the reader who is
unfamiliar with the subject that, neither now nor for a
long time to come, must he expecl to find much resem-
blance between a "hymn" and the kind of composition that
he is wont to associate with the name. For us a hymn is a
poem written in clearly marked "verses" of definite
metrical structure and adorned to a greater or less extent
by regularly recurring rhymes. But it was several centuries
before hymns came to assume this shape anywhere ; and
in a large part of the Christian Church they never assumed
it at all. The early Christian hymns are rather of the
nature of rhythmic and poetical prose : and even when, in

14

THE EARLY CHURCH

Greek-speaking countries at a considerably later date, a
quasi-metrical scheme was evolved for such things, it bore
no resemblance to what the modern Englishman would
call "poetry".

With this caveat, we may begin by noting the fairly
general agreement among scholars that in certain rhyth-
mically phrased passages of St. Paul's Epistles we have
what are probably quotations from early Christian hymns.
The clearest instance is found in Eph. v. 14 : "Awake,
thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead and Christ
shall give thee light." Others are i Tim. iii. 16, i Tim. vi.
15-16 and the other "faithful sayings" in the Pastoral
Epistles (i Tim. i. 15, 2 Tim. ii. 11-13). Again, in the
description of the heavenly worship in the Apocalypse we
find more than one lyrical outpouring of praise and adora-
tion set upon the lips of the angels and the redeemed. Such
are the "Holy, holy, holy" and "Worthy art Thou" in
Rev. iv. 8, 1 1, and, the "Worthy is the Lamb" in Rev. v. 9,
with the "Blessing and glory and honour and power" that
follows. It is not unreasonable to suppose that in these
''hymns" we have a reflection of the liturgical language
familiar to the ears of worshippers on earth : a language
which, if this be the case, was full of echoes of the Old
Testament. Conversely, these songs, consecrated by their
setting and by the universal reverence accorded to the
book in which they appear, must have had a potent in-
fluence on the course of liturgical development in the
future. They are, as Dr. Burn has said, "the types of future
hymnody". 9

In trying to visualize the worship in which such "hymns
and spiritual songs" played a part, we must beware of
postulating any such rigidly fixed liturgical formulae as
came to be the rule at a later date. We know that in the
earliest days the custom of "tongue-speaking" introduced
an anarchic element into the Church's worship that caused
it to be frowned upon by St. Paul and finally to fall into

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

desuetude. And, even when this had taken place, the high
honour paid to the "prophet" gave wide scope for the
personal inspiration of the individual. Such is the situation
portrayed in the Didache, in which we seem to have a
picture of a Church-life that by the time the book was
written had become mostly a thing of the past, but still
survived in the more remote parts of the Church. 10 The
striking formulae for the thanksgivings over the bread and
wine ( 9) and the thanksgiving after communion ( 10)
may be taken as specimens of the way in which the
prophets were in the habit of fulfilling their task in cele-
brating the Eucharist. In all these the rhythmical and
imaginative quality associated with poetry is clearly
marked : and the last is couched in the form of three
definite strophes, each ending with the same conclusion.
It may be roughly translated as follows :

We give thanks to Thee, Holy Father,

for Thy holy name which Thou hast made to tabernacle

in our hearts

and for the knowledge and faith and immortality
which Thou hast made known unto us through Jesus

Thy Son ;
To Thee be glory for ever and ever.

Thou, LORD Almighty, hast created all things for Thy Name's

sake

and hast given food and drink to men for their enjoyment,
that they might give thanks unto Thee ;
but on us Thou hast bestowed spiritual food and drink

and eternal life through Thy Son :
Above all we give thanks to Thee because Thou art

mighty ;
To Thee be glory for ever and ever.

Remember, O LORD, Thy Church

to deliver it from all evil and to perfect it in Thy love.
Sanclify it and gather it together from the four winds into

Thy kingdom
which Thou hast prepared for it.

For thine is the power and the glory for ever and ever.

16

THE EARLY CHURCH

Let grace come and let this world pass away.

Hosanna to the GOD of David.
If any be holy, let him come : if any be not, let him repent.

Maran-atha.

Amen.

"Here," says Dom Leclercq, "we have the rudiments of
rhythmical prayer in the first century : and if these prayers
are not hymns in the sense that the word has assumed in
liturgical language, they are, we may say, the sources and
models of Christian hymnography." n

Nor did this rhythmical style of prayer cease when the
"charismatic" ministry gave way to a localized and official
one. It is certain that down to the third century a wide
liberty of improvization was left to the celebrant. In
Justin Martyr's account of the Liturgy in his time (c. 150)
we are expressly told that the President offered prayer "to
the best of his power". 12 But such improvizations tended
to assume a distinctive "liturgical" style that marked them
off from other and less sacred utterances. In the days of
transition "the bishops" (to quote Dom Leclercq again)
"must have regarded it as a point of honour not to impro-
vize with less abundance and facility than the prophets
who were hierarchically inferior to them". 13 Thus the
tendency to a rhythmic and poetic phraseology (an easy
matter on Greek lips) was maintained. It is generally
agreed that in the long and beautiful intercession in chaps.
59-61 of Clement of Rome's Epistle to the Corinthians
(c. 96) wehavean exampleofsuch "Eucharistic prayer". 14
The same rhythmical effe6l is to be seen in certain grandly
phrased passages in the glorious Epistle to Diognetus
( 7 3 9 3 n 3 I2 )> of which a brief citation may serve as a
specimen :

He (i.e. the Word of GOD) is the Eternal, Who to-day is

reckoned a Son,
Through Whom the Church is made rich

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

And grace is unfolded and multiplied in the saints,

giving understanding,

revealing mysteries,

proclaiming times,

rejoicing in the faithful,

bestowing gifts on them that seek,
to whom the pledges of faith are not broken
nor the decrees of the fathers transgressed.

In the offering of such prayer the congregation was not
content simply to "stand and wait", but would associate
itself with the action of the celebrant by various forms of
response. It is quite possible that the prayer of St.
Clement just mentioned was not a simple monologue, but
was rather of the nature of a litany a form which we
know to have been already employed in pagan worship
and which has an obvious psychological value in pro-
ducing a cumulative emotional effect. 15 Each clause of the
long intercession would be said first by the celebrant and
then repeated by the congregation after him. Or the faith-
ful might intervene by means of the method of "acclama-
tion" (i.e. the repetition of brief liturgical formulae again
and again) , of which we catch echoes in the Apocalypse
and which still survives in the Eastern Church. 16 "The
early Christians," as Dom Cabrol has pointed out, "loved
these formulae and used them as an expression of greetingj
a token of union, a sign of recognition, almost as a pass-
word". 17 Such cries as 'Amen', 'Maranatha', 'Hosanna',
'Alleluia' and 'Kyrie eleison' would punctuate the course
of the rite : or the congregation would make its contribu-
tion in the shape of a brief familiar refrain. In the staccato
clauses of the final lines of the Didache thanksgiving
quoted above we seem to hear these acclamations piling
up in a swelling crescendo of fervour.

This use of the "refrain" was already familiar in some of
the psalms of the Old Testament : and we have alluded
to the further development of it in the earliest type
of psalmody practised in the Christian Church, viz. the

18

THE EARLY CHURCH

so-called cantus responsorius, in which during the reading of
a psalm the congregation would intervene from time to
time with an identical response called the hjpopsalma
"the simplest form of Christian prose hymnography in the
Greek language". 18 It is further illustrated by one of the
earliest Christian hymns to have come down to us in
extenso the poem that closes the Banquet of the Ten
Virgins by Methodius (see below, p. 26), in which each
stanza is followed by a short refrain called UTTCIKOTJ. It is
likely that some of these "refrains" have survived in the
shorter of the early Christian hymns mentioned in the last
section of this chapter.

In addition to these "acclamations" we have abundant
grounds for believing that the congregation would some-
times contribute more extended "hymns" on their own
account. In early Christianity the truth that "the Spirit
is given to every man to profit withal" was strongly empha-
sized : and thus those who had the poetic gift would find a
warm welcome awaiting the products of their inspiration,
which would be gladly taken over and used by their
fellow- worshippers. St. Paul, speaking to the Corinthians
concerning individual contributions to their common
worship, says : "When ye come together, each one hath a
psalm, hath a teaching, hath a revelation, hath a tongue,
hath an interpretation" (i Cor. xiv. 26). It is from
"hymns" of this sort which had attained to a specially
wide currency that the quotations in the Apostle's letters
mentioned above are presumably taken. It may even be
that the very abundance in which such hymns were pro-
duced, and the consequent rapidity with which the earlier
ones tended to be supplanted by others, explain (together
with their inconspicuous origin) their general failure to
survive. We have clear evidence that in the second and
third centuries these psalmi idiotici or private psalms
existed in large numbers. 1 9 Describing the Christian Agape
(or "Love-feast") Tertullian (c. 200) says : "Each man is

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

stirred to sing songs publicly to GOD either from the Holy
Scriptures or of his own invention according to his
ability." 20 An interesting passage in the Church historian
Eusebius gives a quotation from an anonymous contro-
versial work written against the second-century heretic
Artemon, in which the author speaks of "psalms and odes
such as from the beginning were written by believers,
hymns to the Christ, the Word of GOD, calling Him
Goo". 21 Another passage in Eusebius tells of Nepos, an
Egyptian bishop (apparently of the third century), as the
author of an "abundant psalmody" that won wide accept-
ance. 22 The epithet idiotici would seem to imply that such
"psalms" or hymns were originally produced for purposes
of private devotion. It was of such use that St. Paul was
apparently thinking when he gave his admonition to the
Ephesians even as he and Silas in prison at Philippi are
described as "praying and singing hymns unto GOD"
(Ads xvi. 25). But there would be nothing surprising in
their forcing their way into public worship, at least locally
especially in an age when the forms of. worship were
still fluid. We can readily believe that there was objection
to their finding a home within the sacred enclosure of the
Eucharist : and, indeed, Justin Martyr in his description
makes no mention of either psalms or hymns as a part of
that service. But there would be other occasions for their
use : and it was in this fashion, we may presume, that, by
the operation of the principle of "the survival of fittest",
a few of them finally won their way to universal use and
became a permanent part of Christian worship.

In this connection we may note the much-debated
passage in Pliny's Letter to Trajan (c. 105), in which,
describing the habits of the Christians in his province of
Bithynia, he speaks of them as "assembling together early
in the morning and singing by turns (invicem) a song to
Christ as a god". 23 In this "song" some have seen a
Messianic psalm : others (including the great French

20

THE EARLY CHURCH

scholar Duchesne) have preferred a primitive form of the
Morning Hymn that was to develop later into the Gloria
in excelsis. Z4: Others, again, would hold that the word used
for "song" (carmen) is employed in its technical sense of
"incantation" and refers to the priest's consecration of the
Eucharist, to which the people made response. But all this
must remain a matter of speculation in view of the vague-
ness both of the terms used and of Pliny's knowledge of the
subjecl.

Besides their obvious value in voicing and stimulating
devotion, a second motive for the use of hymns, which was
to have immense importance again and again in later
ages, would seem to have become operative to some extent
at a very early date. The heretical seds quickly dis-
covered the value of poetry as a means of disseminating
their doclrine among the masses : for poetry is at once
attractive in itself and easy to remember, especially when
it is set to tunes of a popular kind. We know from Ter-
tullian that the Gnostics Marcion and Valentinus resorted
to this device in the middle of the second century : 25 and
a generation later the Syrian Gnostics also adopted it with
great success, as we shall see. Nor did the Church disdain
to meet the challenge in a similar way. Irenaeus (c. 180)
tells us how "a presbyter" whom he had known in his
youthful days at Ephesus had taught him a short
poem directed against the Gnostic Markos. 26 Probably,
too, many ofthepsalmi idiotici were written with a similar
purpose. Human nature being what it is, it was only to be
expeded that the heretics should object to their own
weapon being thus turned against themselves. Thus Paul
of Samosata, the heretical Bishop of Antioch (260-70),
suppressed "the psalms which were sung there in honour
of our Lord Jesus Christ" on the ground that "they were
new and the work of new men" 27 a proof, incidentally,
that by this time in the great city of Antioch at any rate
the use of non-scriptural hymns was an established

21

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

custom. For this suppression (among other offences) the
bishops of his province condemned and deposed him
(269) ; thus giving an implicit sanction to the practice that
he had withstood. In the next century, as we shall see, the
Arian controversy was to give it wide extension on both
sides of the fray.

in

The account here given of the hymnody of the pre-
Constantinian Church is an attempt to weave into a co-
herent whole the scattered and often obscure references to
the subject found in the literature of the period. It is neces-
sarily therefore incomplete and contains a considerable
element of speculation and surmise. From these quick-
sands the reader may turn with relief to a brief considera-
tion of those hymns that have adually come down to us
to which an early if not primitive date may be safely
assigned. Yet even here he will not immediately find the
ground firm under his feet. It has been claimed that in the
recently discovered Odes of Solomon, written in Syriac, we
have the earliest specimens of Christian hymnody that are
in existence. Dr. Rendel Harris, their discoverer, main-
tains that here is nothing less than a lost hymn-book of
the Apostolic, or at least the sub-Apostolic, Church.
According to him they were written in Greek by a Jewish
Christian towards the end of the first century and are the
private poems of a non-sacramental mystic. 28 On the other
hand, Archbishop Bernard, who edited them in Texts and
Studies, considers that the Syriac is probably the original
form, that they were written not long before A.D. 200, and
that they are "baptismal hymns for use in public worship,
either for catechumens or for those who have recently been
baptized". 29 These two estimates are sufficiently opposed
in themselves : but the question is further complicated by
the fad that Harnack considered the Odes to be a Christian
recension of Jewish originals, while others detect in them
signs of Gnostic inspiration. 30 Their great beauty and

22

THE EARLY CHURCH

interest cannot be denied : and if (as seems now to be the
prevailing opinion) they really are of Christian origin, we
may regard them as furnishing excellent examples of the
psalmi idiotici spoken of above. But having regard to the
obscurity that surrounds them and to the facl: that, even
if their provenance be Christian, they have left no trace
behind in Christian worship, we may be excused if we give
them no more than passing mention.

The case is otherwise with what had usually been re-
garded hitherto as the earliest Christian hymn that has
come down to us, at least as a complete whole the
beautiful <a>s IXapov ('Joyful Light'). Here we have
something which is not only of great antiquity and in-
dubitably Christian origin, but has occupied an honoured
place in the worship of the Eastern Church since a very
early period. It has been attributed to the martyr Athena-
goras (c. 1 80) : but this seems to rest on a mistake. There
can be no doubt, however, that it is very old : for St.
Basil, writing c. 370, speaks of it thus : "We cannot say who
is the father of these expressions at the Thanksgiving at
the Lighting of the Lamps : but it is an ancient formula
which the people repeat : and no one has ever yet been
accused of impiety for saying, 'We hymn the Father and
the Son and the Holy Spirit of GOD.' " 31 Whether origin-
ally written for public worship or for private use, it had
already by St. Basil's time become part of the Vesper
Office held "at the lighting of the lamps" and therefore
called in Greek eVtAu'^viov and in Latin Lucernarium. It
still forms part of the Evening Office of the Eastern
Church. It has been translated by many hands ; the best-
known renderings being the unmetrical rhymed version
by John Keble, 'Hail, gladdening Light,' *i8, and Robert
Bridges's translation, 'O gladsome Light,' t26g, written
to fit the exquisite tune by Bourgeois for the metrical
version of Nunc dimittis in the Genevan Psalter.

Another early hymn is that found in the Apostolical

c 23

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Constitutions (IV th century) again as part of the Vesper
Office. Dom Leclercq considers it to be of the third
century at the latest. 32 It may be translated thus :

We praise Thee, we hymn Thee, we bless Thee for Thy
great glory, Lord King, Father of Christ the Immaculate
Lamb that taketh away the sins of the world. Thou art worthy
to be praised, Thou art worthy to be hymned, Thou art
worthy to be glorified, Who art God and Father through the
Son in the Holy Spirit for ever and ever. Amen.

The reader will at once notice the resemblance to the
Gloria in excelsis. This, too, is a non-Scriptural hymn of
early date ; its opening words being suggested by the
Angelic Song heard by the shepherds on the night of
Christ's nativity. The Apostolic Constitutions (where it
appears in a longer form than in the Roman Liturgy)
reveal it as being in use in the East at the Morning Office
in the fourth century, and in an earlier form it may be
much older. Concerning its structure Dom Cabrol says :
"The rhythm is free : but the harmonious arrangement of
the phrases and their subsidiary clauses, especially striking
in the Greek, seems based on a studied succession of
syllables and accents and even rhyme, the use of which
gives greater symmetry to the cadence." 33 It has never
been used at Mass in the East : but it appears in the Roman
Mass from the beginning of the sixth century at first,
however, only on Sundays and festivals and for use by the
Bishop alone. 34 The Triumphal Hymn orSanffius, on the
other hand, forms part of the Mass in both East and
West : but it is virtually a Scriptural composition.

Another very ancient hymn is the so-called Trisagion,
which may be translated thus :

Holy GOD, Holy and Mighty, Holy and Immortal, have
mercy upon us.

Its earliest attestation is by the Council of Chalcedon
(451) : but it is undoubtedly of much earlier date. 35 Even

24

THE EARLY CHURCH

more interesting is an ancient Easter song which survives
in the Greek service-book called the Pentecostarion, and
which Cardinal Pitra tells us was still sung in the original
Greek at the Easter solemnities in Rome in the ninth cen-
tury. It may be taken as an example of the "acclamations"
spoken of above. Its effect is incommunicable in an English
translation ; so it may be given in Pitra's Latin version :

Pascha (i.e. Passover)
Sacrum nobis hodie apparuit !
Pascha novum, sanflum !
Pascha mysticum !
Pascha augustissimum !
Pascha, Christus Redemptor !
Pascha immaculatum !
Pascha magnum !
Pascha fidelium I
Pascha quo portae nobis
Paradisi aperta sunt !
Pascha

Omnes sanftificans fideles !
Romae Papam tu, Christe, conserva.^

All these ancient hymns have survived in the public
worship of East or West. It remains to mention three
others of the same period which have come down to us,
though neither now nor (so far as we know) at any time
have they been used for liturgical purposes.

The first is a Hymn to Christ attached to the Paedagogus
of Clement of Alexandria (170-220), beginning UTO^LOV
7Tc6Aa)v dSacuv, 'Bridle of colts untamed. 3 37 It is thus the
earliest Christian hymn that can be definitely dated. Un-
like the "rhythmical" hymns mentioned above it is written
in a classical metre (Anapaestic dimeter), and in this way
(as we shall see) lies off the main track on which Eastern
hymnody was to proceed. The second is the "Amherst
papyrus", so-called because it was discovered in the
library of Lord Amherst in Norfolk. 38 This may be dated
about the end of the third century and is written in
anapaests. (For an explanation of this and other metrical

25

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

terms used in this book the reader is referred to Appendix
A.) "It has been described", says Baumstark, "as a versi-
fied ethical catechism of early Christendom, although it
might quite as fitly be regarded as a hymn forming part
of the liturgy of initiation addressed to the newly bap-
tized." Its great interest in the history of hymnody lies in
two directions. First, its anapaests are regulated as much
by accent as by quantity. Thus it marks an early stage in
the process, common to the hymnody of both East and
West, by which accent came to be the regulating principle
of prosody in place of the vowel-quantity of the old classi-
cal metres. Secondly, we have here the earliest extant
example of the alphabetic acrostic which, already em-
ployed frequently in the Hebrew psalms, was to be so
marked a feature of Eastern hymnody. In the initial
letters of the lines the letters of the Greek alphabet in their
order appear three times over.

The last of these three hymns has been already re-
ferred to the hymn beginning "AvwQzv irapQevoi, 'Up,
maidens !', that closes the Banquet of the Ten Virgins
ascribed to Methodius (d. 3ii). 39 In this curious work ten
virgins are represented as engaging in a kind of competi-
tion in declaring the glory of their state. Finally Thekla,
the victor, chants a psalm to which the others respond by
a brief refrain :

I keep myself chaste for Thee, and wielding light-bearing
torches, O Bridegroom, I will go to meet Thee.

Here we have the use of the refrain for the first time in
any extant hymn. In addition, the iambics of the verses
are not less accentual in character than the anapaests of
the "Amherst papyrus" ; while the acrostic also re-
appears, each of the 24 stanzas beginning with the succes-
sive letters of the alphabet. Thus three of the most charac-
teristic features of late Greek hymnody accentual versi-
fication, acrostic and refrain are already anticipated.

26

CHAPTER II
HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

THE earliest products of Greek hymnody have been
dealt with in the preceding chapter. It must be re-
membered that the facl that they are in Greek does
not necessarily imply that their use was confined to the
Eastern portions of the Roman Empire. In the first Chris-
tian centuries Greek, not Latin, was the usual language of
worship not only in the East but also in a large part of the
Christianized West. The earliest surviving literature
emanating from the Church of Rome was written in
Greek : and it is certain that Greek continued to be its
liturgical language until the middle of the third century.
It was in this way, possibly, that hymns written in Greek
like the Gloria in excelsis 40 and the Te decet laus (see p. 24)
became part of the worship of the Western Church ; to
retain their position in a translated form when the change
from Greek to Latin took place. Still more interesting is
the case of the Trisagion, which survives in the Roman
rite (in the Good Friday Reproaches) in its Greek as well
as its Latin form : 'Agios o Theos, Agios ischyros, Agios
athanatos, eleison imas.' A similar Greek survival is the
Kyrie eleison; and we have seen how until the ninth
century the Pascha acclamations continued to be sung
at Rome in Greek.

From the middle of the fourth century onwards the

hymnodies of East and West part company and proceed

on widely different lines. Yet in both cases there is a great

extension in the use of hymns, which soon become for the

first time a definitely recognized part of the Church's

27

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

worship. This extension, too, is in each case largely
prompted by the same cause the fight against heresy.
We have already spoken of the use of hymns by the early
heretics as a means of winning a popular currency for their
doctrines. Of those who exploited this method none was so
thorough or so successful as the Syrian Gnostic, Barde-
sanes, at the end of the second century. He and his son
Harmonius produced a "Gnostic psalter" of 150 hymns.
It was to meet this challenge that, more than a century
later, the celebrated Ephraem Syrus (?307~373) composed
his Syriac hymns. 41 Ephraem lived at Edessa and ranks
as the most famous of the theologians who wrote in Syriac.
In one of his writings he thus complains :

In the resorts of Bardesanes
There are songs and melodies ;
For seeing that young people
Loved sweet music,
By the harmony of his songs
He corrupted their morals.

To counteract the "poisoned sweetness" of these songs
Ephra'em, we are told, "gathered the daughters of the
Convent", and for them, as they met daily in the churches
of Edessa, "he,- like a spiritual harpist, arranged different
kinds of songs and taught them the variation of chants
until the whole city was gathered to him and the party
of the adversary was put to shame". These hymns of
Ephraem with their strophes, refrains and "rhythmical"
structure based not on quantity but on accent and, on the
presence of an equal number of syllables in corresponding
lines would appear to have had considerable influence
in determining the form not only of Syriac hymnody, but
of Greek hymnody too. 42 Besides hymns in the more
ordinary sense Ephraem also cultivated a literary genre of
his own called "metrical homilies", in which he attacked
not the Bardesanites only but other forms of heresy as
well. A number of his hymns have been translated into

28

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN- CHURCH

English, though none has come into common use with the
exception of Dr. Burkitt's 'Receive, O Lord, in heaven
above' t z 94- As a writer of Syriac hymns he had many
successors, but none of equal fame.

At the period when Ephraem in further Syria was
coping with the relics of Gnosticism, the main body of the
Empire was in the throes of a conflict between orthodoxy
and the new heresy called Arianism. Its founder, Arius,
used from the outset songs set to popular times to propa-
gate his ideas. "The workers of the port," says Duchesne,
"the sailors, the idlers and the common people knew these
songs and deafened the faithful of Alexandria with
them." 43 The earliest and greatest of the opponents of
Arius, the austere St. Athanasius, was apparently content,
so far as we know, to denounce the frivolity and unseemli- .
ness of this practice and did not attempt to organize a
counter-crusade of song. But during the fourth century it
would seem that the custom of singing hymns in the
churches was widely spread in the East : for we know, on
the authority of St. Augustine, that at Milan in 386 the
same custom was introduced in the West "after the use of
the Eastern provinces". 44 On the other hand, the 59th
canon of the Council of Laodicea 45 (held between 343
and 381) allowed the liturgical use of nothing save Holy
Scripture and forbade the singing ofpsalmi idiotici pre-
sumably to avoid the risk of contaminating the orthodoxy
of the faithful by means of heretical hymns. "This prohibi-
tion, however," says Dom Leclercq, "would not appear to
have been very widely observed." 46 In any case it is
certain that at the end of the same century the alternative
method of "not allowing the devil to have all the good
tunes" was again boldly resorted to at Constantinople.
When St. Chrysostom became Bishop there in 398, the
Arians were not allowed to worship within the city walls.
They made up for this, however, by coming into the city
on the evenings of Saturdays, Sundays and the greater

29

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

festivals and assembling in the public porticoes and other
places of common resort. Here they passed the night in
singing hymns (with acroteleuteia or refrains) in which they
set forth the Arian doctrines and hurled taunts at the
orthodox. These performances attracted large crowds :
and by way of counteracting their influence Chrysostom,
with the support and at the expense of the Empress
Eudoxia, initiated solemn nocturnal processions for the
chanting of hymns with such ceremonial adjuncts as silver
crosses and lighted candles. These competitive demonstra-
tions not unnaturally led to riot and bloodshed, with the
result that the Arian hymn-singings were forbidden by
law. Their orthodox rivals, on the other hand, became a
permanent institution. 47

One of Chrysostom's immediate predecessors in the see
of Constantinople, Gregory of Nazianzus (d. c. 390), the
life-long friend of St. Basil, had already voiced the ortho-
doxy of the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople in a
number of poems written in the closing years of his
chequered life. Like our own Bishop Ken, he had been
compelled by the political vicissitudes of the time to resign
his see (381) and to go into retirement (in a cell in his
native city Nazianzus) : and, like him, too, he solaced
his enforced leisure with the writing of sacred poetry. His
poems, written almost entirely in the classical metres,
reach a high level of excellence : and a number of them
have been translated into English by the Rev. A. W. Chat-
field in his Songs and Hymns of the Greek Christian Poets
(1876)."

Another Christian poet of slightly later date was
Synesius (c. 365-414) . A genial country gentleman of philo-
sophic tastes living in Gyrene in North Africa, he went in
397 to Constantinople, where he vainly tried to induce the
Emperor Arcadius to take steps to meet the growing bar-
barian menace. After his return he was gradually con-
verted to Christianity ; and in 4,10, much against his will,

30

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

he allowed himself to be made Bishop of Ptolemais. Here
(to quote Gibbon's characteristic comment) "the philo-
sophic bishop supported with dignity the character which
he had assumed with reluctance". 49 Even as a Christian
he remained a good deal of a Neoplatonist : and his ortho-
doxy has been called in question. But his ten Odes, written
in various classical metres, are of great interest and beauty
in their presentation of Christian doctrine as seen through
the eyes of a Platonist philosopher. Mrs. Browning even
went so far as to call Synesius "the chief, for all true and
natural gifts, of all our Greek Christian poets" ; and adds,
"These Odes have, in fact, a wonderful rapture and
ecstasy". 50 She herself translated two of them : and all ten
were translated by Mr. Chatfield. One of his versions (of
the roth Ode), 'Lord Jesus, think on me' *i85 f77, finds
a place in most modern hymnals : but the translator him-
self has told us that it is more a paraphrase than an exact
translation. More characteristic of Synesius's thought is
another version from the same hand which appears in
A.M. 'Lift up thyself, my soul' *66i. This is a really fine
hymn, not only noble both in thought and language but
of a characteristically Hellenic type hardly represented
otherwise at all in our hymn-books. It helps, too, to fill the
serious gap arising from the deficiency of hymns addressed
to the Father as compared with those addressed to the
Incarnate Son.

Neither the hymns of Gregory nor those of Synesius
succeeded in finding a place in the public services of the
Eastern Church. They were hardly adapted for the pur-
pose in any case : and their employment of the classical
metres of Greece set them outside of the lines on which
Greek hymnody was destined to develop. With a single
exception (the three Iambic Canons of St. John Dama-
scene) the service-books of the Eastern Church include no
hymns written in those metres. The character of the vast
body of hymns that they contain is rather Oriental than

31

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Hellenic, alike in matter and literary form : their filiation
proceeds from other sources than Greek poetry. At the
period when these hymns were produced classical Greek
was dying out : moreover, as Neale says, "in the decline of
the language accent was trampling down quantity". The
line was no longer based on the arrangement of long- and
short-vowelled syllables into various types of metrical
"feet", but on the alternation of accented and unaccented
syllables, of arsis and thesis ; the classical distinction be-
tween long and short vowels tending more and more to
disappear. 51 The change (as we shall see) was common to
both Greek and Latin hymnody : but in the case of the
former it was no doubt encouraged by the influence of
Syriac hymnody, which was accentual in prosody from
the beginning. 52 Another influence operating in the same
direction was that of the elaborate prose of the later Greek
rhetoricians. There is good reason to believe that some of
the earlier Greek "rhythmical" hymns were nothing else
than combinations of extracts from the homilies of the
Greek Fathers. In an instruction by St. Dorotheus (IV th
century) to his monks in Palestine we find a commentary
on the successive lines of a hymn on the Resurrection
which turns out on examination to be simply a cento of
passages from an Easter homily of St. Gregory of Nazi-
anzus (382). "The rhythmic movement of the phrases,"
says M. Petrides, "was accentuated in such a way. that
one had only to join to them an appropriate melody to
obtain a hymn worthy to figure in the Paschal office." 53
Another of St. Dorotheus's instructions comments on a
hymn to Martyrs which has a similar origin.

It was under these influences that the Troparia were pro-
duced which from the fifth century onwards achieved an
immense and increasing popularity in the worship of the
Eastern Church. In their earliest form these Troparia would
appear to have been short hymns consisting of a single
stanza. To the old-fashioned and strict-minded they

32

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

seemed a mere "luxury of devotion" to be frowned upon.
Cardinal Pitra has collected three quaint stories to this .
effect, 54 in all of which monks who have become en-
amoured of the new form of singing are rebuked by a holy
and austere abbot, who, while admitting that such things
may be tolerable for the secular clergy and the laity, re-
gards them as a violation of ancient tradition and un-
worthy of the ascetic life of a monk. At the same time the
stories reveal that even in the monasteries this prejudice
was more and more breaking down.

Of these early Troparia a large number survive : and
many find a place in the Greek service books, though they
are not always easy to identify. Two of them, presumably
dating from the sixth century, have achieved immense
fame and become enshrined within the Mass itself. The
first is the Cherubic Hymn sung in the chief Eastern Liturgies
before the "Great Entrance". This is generally ascribed to
the time of the Emperor Justinian : it was inserted in the
Liturgy in the reign of his successor Justin II (565-78). 55
It runs as follows :

Let us who mystically represent the Cherubim and sing the
thrice-holy hymn to the quickening Trinity lay by at this time
all worldly cares, that we may receive the King of glory,
invisibly attended by the angelic orders. Alleluia, Alleluia,
Alleluia.

In this connection we may notice that in the Liturgy of
the Church of Jerusalem, commonly called the Liturgy of
St. James, this Cherubic Hymn is accompanied by a
prayer, to be said by the Priest, which, as freely translated
by the Rev. G. Moultrie, has become well-known in the
guise of the Eucharistic hymn, 'Let all mortal flesh keep
silence' 1318 (Dr. Mason's 'Not a thought of earthly things'
*7i7 is an alternative version). Another prayer from the
same Liturgy (to be said by the Deacon before the Priest
goes to the sacristy after the service) has been similarly
paraphrased in metrical form as the hymn 'From glory

33

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

to glory advancing' j 310. It must be repeated, however,
that in their original form these hymns are not hymns
at all but prayers.

Besides the Cherubic Hymn another hymn, pre-
sumably of the same period, is attributed to the pen of the
Emperor Justinian himself, beginning with the words
'0 juovoyevqs 1 wo?. 56 It may be translated thus :

Only-begotten Son and Word of GOD, Immortal, Who
didst vouchsafe for our salvation to take flesh of the holy
Mother of GOD and ever- Virgin Mary, and didst without
mutation become Man and wast crucified, Christ our GOD, and
by death didst overcome death, being one of the Holy Trinity
and glorified together with the Father and the Holy Spirit ;
Save us.

This has become familiar to many English congregations
in Dr. T. A. Lacey's metrical translation, t3 2 5-

Such simple single-stanza Troparia, varying widely both
in the number and in the length of their lines, continue to
figure largely in the Greek service-books, especially after
the first group of psalms in the Night-Office, and are called
by various names according to their character and use.
But as time went on the stanzas were multiplied, thus
forming hymns of considerable length. Sometimes a
number of Idiomela or single-stanza Troparia were strung
loosely together into a long hymn called a Stichera. But
more usually the constituent troparia were welded into an
artistic whole with a definitely articulated structure in the
form called a Contakion after the rolls (contakia) from
which they were sung by the precentor. It is this poetic
form which is associated with the "Middle Period" of
Greek hymnody that brought to birth its most beautiful
and distinguished products the "golden age of Byzan-
tine hymnody", as it has been called. 57 Unfortunately the
service-books (called Tropologia] in which these hymns
were collected were destroyed wholesale by the Iconoclast
reformers of the eighth and ninth centuries. Thus the
hymns in question entirely disappeared except for certain

34

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

fragments that were rescued from oblivion and incorpo-
rated into the later service-books. The so-called "contalda"
in these presumably represent the mutilated remains of
the old Contakia.

Fortunately, however, a considerable number of the
latter have chanced to be preserved in three MSS. Tropo-
logia at Moscow, Rome and Turin, where they remained
unknown for centuries until they were discovered by
Cardinal Pitra, who published a collection of them in
iSyG. 59 The most distinguished of the writers of this
school is the deacon Romanus, called the Melodist. Un-
fortunately there is wide discrepancy of opinion as to his
date. He is said to have come to Constantinople "in the
reign of Anastasius". But there were two emperors of that
name: Anastasius I (491-518) and Anastasius II (713-9)
a difference of two centuries. Pitra declared for the
former. But the German scholar Crist argued 60 (very
reasonably, as it seems) that this would set Romanus back
in the first, formative period of Greek hymnody when (so
far as we know) nothing but Troparia and Idiomela existed ;
though as against this it might be urged that in Metho-
dius's Hymn of the Virgins we have a very early composition
which is not only as elaborate as Romanus's Contakia but
is adually constructed on similar lines. The prevailing
opinion is to follow Grist's choice of the later date. 61 If
this be correft, Romanus flourished just before the first
outbreak of the Iconoclastic controversy.

In addition to his discovery of these hymns Pitra has
also the credit of having found the long lost key to their
prosodic structure and that of the later Greek hymns
generally. Before his time it was generally believed that the
hymns of the Greek service-books were not really poetry
at all, but "measured prose". Neale definitely expressed
this view in the preface to his Hymns of the Eastern Church
published in i862. 62 But even before Neale wrote Pitra
had stumbled on the secret. He himself has told the story

35

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

in his Hymnologie de I'Eglise grecque (iSGy). 63 In 1859 the
future Cardinal, then a Benedidine of Solesmes, visited
St. Petersburg (now Leningrad). Here he came across an
old MS. containing at the end a "Canon of eight Odes"
(a term explained below, p. 39), the text of which was
divided up throughout at frequent intervals by red dots.
Taking each Ode separately and comparing its strophes
with one another, he found that in every strophe the
number of syllables in each corresponding division thus
marked off was the same, though these numbers differed
widely from one another, some of the divisions or "lines"
being much longer than others. An examination of other
MSS. revealed the presence of similar divisions marked on
precisely the same plan. Thus, says Pitra, "the pilgrim was
in possession of the syllabic system of the hymnographers".

This system worked as follows. At the beginning of every
Ode was a strophe called heirmos, usually a strophe taken
from an earlier hymn (in which case only the first line was
indicated). This served as the pattern-strophe for the
whole Ode, regulating at once (i) the melody to which
the Ode was sung, (2) the number of syllables in each
clause or 'line', (3) the beat of the accentuation, this last
ignoring the distinction between long and short vowels
observed in the classical metres. The 'lines' may vary from
3 to 13 syllables, and the strophes from 3 to 33 "lines" hi
each. The strophes following the keirmos are called tro-
paria : and the whole Canon is knit together by an acrostic
supplying the initial letters of the successive strophes. This
acrostic is sometimes alphabetic and sometimes indicates
either the name of the author or the theme of his poem.
Another feature is the ephymnwn or refrain closing each
troparion.

The Canons and Odes thus analysed by Pitra belong to
a later period of Greek hymnody than the Contakia of
Romanus and his school : but the principles of construc-
tion are much the same in the latter as in the former. In

36

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

the Contakia, however, the heirmos is preceded by a brief
strophe called the 77/300,07x0,. 64 In Pitra's opinion these'
earlier hymns are superior to the later Odes and Canons
in freshness and animation. In particular they have a
markedly dramatic character which is completely absent
from their successors. He suggests that (like some of the
earlier Sequences in the West) they were actually sung
with dramatic accompaniments as a substitute for the
theatrical performances of pagan times. 66 He gives a
description of the most celebrated of Romanus's Contakia.
It is a Christmas hymn and consists of 24 long strophes.
The first is the "proem" and differs in structure from the
rest, though it concludes with the refrain that is to end all
the other strophes : 'New-born Child, Who wast GOD
from before all ages.' The second is the heirmos, which
provides the mould for all the other strophes and also
starts the acrostic. The latter consists of the words, TOV
raTTewov 'Pco/jLavov vjjivos, "The hymn of humble Ro-
manus." The first strophe gives a description of the scene
and characters of the Nativity. Later, the Virgin addresses
the Divine Infant, after which the Magi appear and a
dialogue ensues between the Virgin, Joseph and them.
Then the Magi present their gifts ; and the hymn concludes
with an intercession by the Virgin.

Next in importance to Romanus as a representative of
this 'Middle Period' of Greek hymnody may be reckoned
the Patriarch Sergius of Constantinople (610-41), author
of the famous hymn called the Akathistos. It was originally
written as a thanksgiving to the Blessed Virgin for the
defence of Constantinople against the Persians ; and was
so called because it was always sung standing. It is not
unlike the hymns of Romanus in some respeds : but its
form is rather different. It has been translated by Dr. G.
R. Woodward, but its subjed-matter makes it unsuitable
for Anglican worship.

However great the merits of Romanus and his school, it

37

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

is unnecessary to do more than pay a passing tribute to
their historical interest: for, with a single exception (a
Christmas Contakion, 'Bethlehem hath opened Eden' 66 ),
none of their hymns has been translated into English and
the one exception has never come into use. The same
treatment may be accorded to Sophronius, Patriarch of
Jerusalem (629). His Anacreontic hymns, written in
Iambic dimeter, never made their way into the service-
books : but a few of the others, written in the accustomed
"rhythmical" style, have found a place there. None of
these, however, has been translated.

The case is otherwise with the later school of hymnody
which came into existence on the ruins of its predecessor
and, in the teeth of triumphant Iconoclasm, sought to do
all over again its work of using sacred song to bear witness
to and safeguard the orthodox faith. This is the hymnody
that supplies the originals of those translations of Neale's
from the Greek 67 which have become so popular in our
English hymnals. It is the hymnody which has displayed
its voluminous richness for nearly a thousand years in the
Greek service-books that form what may be called the
"Eastern Breviary". Neale calculates that "on a moderate
computation" these Offices "comprise five thousand
closely printed quarto pages in double columns of which
at least four thousand are poetry". 68 They are arranged
in 1 8 volumes : (i) 12 volumes of Menaea, one for each
month (Gk. p?v), corresponding to the Proper of Saints
in the Western Breviary ; (2) the Parakletike, containing
the ferial Offices arranged according to a recurring system
of eight weeks ; (3) the Octoechus, containing the Offices
for Saturday evening and Sunday from the preceding
(the term 'Octoechus' is derived from the Eight "Modes"
(17x01) in which the music of the ferial Offices of each
of the eight weeks in turn is written) ; (4) the Triodion,
containing the services for Lent and the three Sundays
preceding it so named because the Odes in it are usually

38

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

arranged in groups of three ; (5) the Pentecostarion, contain-
ing the services for the seasons of Easter and Pentecost ;

(6) the Euchologion, containing the Occasional Offices ;

(7) the Horologion, containing the Hours of Prayer.

The general principles on which this vast body of hymns
is constructed have been already described in our account
of Pitra's discovery. The most characteristic feature of the
system is the Ode. An Ode (like Romanus's Contakiori) con-
sists of a heirmos followed by a varying number of troparia,
of which the heirmos (usually a strophe of older date) sup-
plies the model. The concluding strophe of an Ode usually
celebrates the Blessed Virgin and is therefore called the
Theotokion, Theotokos meaning "Mother of GOD." The
Odes in their turn are arranged in groups, occasionally of
two or four but usually of three or (in the case of the great
Festival Canons) of eight. The eight Odes forming a
Canon are threaded on an acrostic, usually in verse. These
Canons are sung at Lauds. Their constituent Odes were
written to accompany the Scriptural Canticles that origin-
ally formed part of that service. These Canticles were at
first nine in number : but the second (the Song of Moses
in Deut. xxxii) was omitted because its minatory character
made it unsuitable for festivals, and the corresponding
Ode vanished too. Hence the number eight. In course of
time the other Canticles also practically disappeared,
while the Odes remained. 69

It may conduce to greater clearness if we append a
literal translation of an Ode. It is the first of the eight
Odes comprising the most celebrated of all the Festival
Canons St. John Damascene's great Easter Canon, of
which more will be said shortly. The reader will be
already well-acquainted with it in Neale's metrical
version. The present rendering is necessarily very clumsy :
and it is of course impossible to reproduce the "syllabic"
arrangement. It must suffice to repeat that in the original
Greek the number of syllables in the first line of every

D 39

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

stanza is the same, and so on through succeeding lines.
(The number of these syllables is indicated in brackets.)

Heirmos

The Day of Resurrection ! (8)

Rejoice we, all peoples ! (5)

The Passover of the Lord, the Passover ! (7)

For from death unto life (8)

And from earth unto heaven (6)

Christ our GOD (5)

Hath brought us over (7)

Singing a triumph-song (7)

Troparia '

Let us purify our hearts (8)
And we shall behold, (5)
In the light unapproachable (7)
Of the Resurrection, Christ (8)
Sending forth His rays, and (6)
His greeting ' All hail ' (5)
We shall hear clearly, (7)
Singing a triumph-song (7)

Let the heavens in fitting fashion (8)

Make rejoicing (5)

And let the earth be glad. (7)

Let the world exult, (8)

Both all that is visible (6)

And invisible ; (5)

For Christ is risen, (7)

Our joy everlasting (7)

A word must now be said concerning the circumstances
which gave rise to the movement resulting in the efflor-
escence of this amazing outburst of sacred song. In the
third decade of the eighth century the Emperor Leo the
Isaurian set himself to put down what seemed to him the
excessive and idolatrous veneration paid to images in the
Eastern Church. The faith and arms of Islam were spread-
ing with terrifying rapidity : and his motive was largely to
wipe out a reproach that seemed to make Christianity
easily vulnerable by its stern monotheism. In the long

40

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

drawn-out struggle that followed under Leo and his suc-
cessors the Church for the most part vehemently opposed
the imperial policy : and the contest more and more
assumed the character of a defence of her independence
against the encroachments of the civil power. The heart
and soul of the anti-Iconoclast party was the monks : and
their resistance found its most formidable strongholds in
two monasteries first, the Laura of Saint Sabas near
Jerusalem, set "like an eagle's nest" on a crag overlooking
the wild valley of the Kedron, and secondly (at a rather
later date) the famous monastery of St. John the Baptist
in Constantinople, commonly called the Studion (or
Studium) after the name of its founder, Studios. The lead-
ing figures in both these centres of opposition were not
only theologians but poets as well : and in their hands
hymnody was once again made to serve the interests of
orthodoxy against the wiles of "heresy".

Even before the Iconoclastic controversy began Jeru-
salem had produced a hymn-writer of note in St. Andrew
of Crete (660-732), who before becoming Archbishop of
that island had been a monk in the Holy City, though not
at St. Sabas. Whether or not he was the inventor of the
Canon, his are the earliest Canons that survive : and a
number of them are still found in the Greek service-books.
The most celebrated is the so-called "Great Canon",
which runs to no less than 250 strophes and is still sung in
Lent mercifully for the singers, only once in its entirety.
Part of it was translated by Neale ('Whence shall my tears
begin ? ' ) . He wrote Triodia and Idiomela as well : and Neale's
translations include two sets ofStichera for Palm Sunday
and Maundy Thursday. In publishing his well-known
Lenten hymn 'Christian, dost thou see them ? ', Neale
described it as translated "from a Stichera of St. Andrew
of Crete" : but no Greek original has been found.

At St. Sabas the two greatest names the greatest in
later Greek hymnody are those of St. Cosmas (d. c, 760)

41

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

and St. John of Damascus (d. before 754). 70 To both (along
with others) is given the title of "the Melodist" a term
which appears to include the musician's art as well as the
poet's. To John is attributed the arrangement of the
Octoechus according to the Eight Modes. The two saints
were connected by close personal ties. Gosmas was the
adopted son of John's father : and the two lads were
educated together under the care of another Cosmas, who
was a hymn-writer too and in company with whom they
later joined the Laura of St. Sabas together. Cosmas be-
came Bishop of Maiuma in 743 : but John had his head-
quarters at Jerusalem till the end of his life. Neale
describes him as "the last but one of the Fathers of the
Greek Church and the greatest of her poets". The latter
honour would in facl seem rather to belong to Romanus :
but when Neale wrote he was undiscovered. John was the
author of an elaborate theological treatise called The
Fountain of Knowledge., and also wrote three celebrated
Orations defending the cause of the icons against their
opponents. It is, however, in virtue of his gift of wedding
clear-cut dogma to the poetic art that he has exercised his
greatest influence on posterity. In this he was the superior
of Cosmas, in whom the theologian for the most part
dominated the poet. Cosmas's chief work was a number of
Canons for the Festivals : but these pale before the grand
series of similar compositions that came from John's pen
and represent the high-water-mark of his achievement.
They are six in number and celebrate the festivals
of Christmas, the Theophany, Pentecost, Easter, St.
Thomas's (i.e. Low) Sunday and the Ascension. The first
of these are in Iambic metre : the others are in the usual
"rhythmical" form. In not a few of the Festival Canons
"the Odes of the several Canons by St. Cosmas and St.
John of Damascus are interwoven, brotherlike, with one
another". Besides his Odes and Canons John wrote
numerous Idiomela as well.

42

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

In his translations from the Greek hymns Neale pro-
perly gave special attention to the works of John and
Gosmas. The former's masterpiece the so-called
"Golden Canon" or "King of Canons" for Easter he
has rendered in extenso. The first of its eight Odes provides
one of the most joyous and popular of our Easter hymns :
e ['Tis] the Day of Resurredion 5 *i$2 \itf. The last Ode
of the same Canon appears in E.H. : Thou hallowed
chosen morn of praise' | I 3^- The four Odes translated
from the Canon for St. Thomas's Sunday include another
famous Easter hymn (Ode i) : 'Come, ye faithful, raise the
strain' *i33 jisi. The Idiomela for All Saints, 'Those
eternal bowers', appeared in the 1904 edition of Hymns
A. and M. (622). A Stichera beginning 'Take thy last kiss'
is an exquisite threnody on the departed soul (taken from
the Burial Office in the Euchologiori) , but is rather a sacred
lyric than a hymn in our sense of the word. The Euchologion
also provides the original of Mr. Athelstan Riley's 'What
sweet of life endureth' f36o from the Burial Office for
Priests. Neale further translated the eight Odes of the
Canon for Christmas Day by St. Cosmas : but these have
not come into use as hymns. A cento, however, from the
same writer's Canon for the Transfiguration provides the
hymn 'In days of old on Sinai 5 *46o.

At Constantinople an elder con temporary of Cosmas and
John like them at once poet and defender of the icons
was Germanus (634-734), Patriarch of Constantinople
and author of (among other things) the original of the now
familiar Christmas carol, 'A great and mighty wonder'
fig. But the fame of the imperial city as a home of hymn-
writers is centred in the great monastery of the Studium
and belongs to a later stage in the Iconoclastic con-
troversy. Its sternly ascetic Abbot, St. Theodore (c. 759-
826), was a foremost champion of the icons, in defence of
which he found a more than dubious ally in the cruel and
unscrupulous Empress Irene. He wrote an exultant Canon

43

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

sung on "Orthodoxy Sunday" (the ist Sunday in Lent)
celebrating the victory of their cause. This has been trans-
lated by Neale ('A song, a song of gladness 5 ), as also
another Canon (for Sexagesima) on the Last Judgment
described by him as "the finest Judgment Hymn of the
Church till the Dies Irae". More famous still was St. Theo-
phanes (c. 800-850), who is considered by Neale to "hold
the third place among Greek hymn- writers". Neale trans-
lated a Stichera and Idiomela of his : but neither is suitable
for use as an English hymn. Two other hymn-writers, one
certainly, the other probably, to be connected with the
Studium, remain to be mentioned. The first is St. Theoc-
tistus (c. 890), author of the "Suppliant Canon", of which
a portion has been translated by Neale as the beautiful
hymn 'Jesu ! Name all names above' *775 t4 J 8, and also
of the original of the Lent hymn, 'Sweet Saviour, in Thy
pitying grace' *4go. The second is St. Anatolius, who
wrote 'Fierce was the wild billow' t388, and the Stichera
for St. Stephen's Day, 'The Lord and King of all things'
j*32. The Greek original from which Neale made 'The
day is past and over' *2i J276 is ascribed by him to St.
Anatolius (whom incidentally he confused with a saint of
the same name who lived some centuries earlier) : but it
is actually a metrical portion of the Late Evening Service
of the Orthodox Church. 71

To the "Sabaites" and "Studites" may be added a
third group of monastic hymn-writers of the same school
of hymnody. These lived in the South of Italy and Sicily,
where many opponents of Iconoclasm had taken refuge
from persecution. To this group belongs Joseph the
Hymnographer (c. 810-883), though he left his native
Sicily as a young man and passed his life in Constantinople
and elsewhere. He is wrongly called "Joseph of the
Studium" by Neale, who confused him with another
Joseph (of Thessalonica), who lived at the Studium and
also wrote hymns. 72 He is the most prolific of the Greek

44

HYMNS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH

hymnographers : Pitra says that he wrote more than a
thousand. Neale had a poor opinion of his powers, accus-
ing him of tawdiness and verbiage ; though he contrived '
to base on centos from Joseph's Canons two of the best of
his own hymns : 'Stars of the morning' *4.2$ f 245 and
'Let our choirs new anthems raise' *44i fiSy. On the
other hand, Joseph's 'alphabetic' Canon on the Ascension
has been ranked as "probably the finest hymn extant" on
that theme. 73 . It was translated by Neale, who repro-
duced the alphabetic acrostic. Two other of Neale's
hymns, 'O happy band of pilgrims' and 'Safe home, safe
home in port,' were described by him in the first edition of
his Hymns of the Eastern Church as "after Joseph of the
Studium" : but in the second edition he admitted that
"they contain so little from the Greek that they ought not
to have been included" as translations. The same admis-
sion is made in regard to 'Art thou weary ? 3 . 74

Another well-known hymn-writer of this school was St.
Methodius (d. 836) not to be confused with his much
earlier namesake, the author of the Banquet of the Virgins.
The art of writing Greek hymns persisted in Italy long
after it had almost died out elsewhere. A colony of Greek
monks at Grottaferrata, near Tusculum, carried it on into
the twelfth century. 75 A further hymn- writer, who be-
longed to none of the groups mentioned above, is Metro-
phanes, Bishop of Smyrna (d. c. 9 1 o) , author of eight Canons
to the Holy Trinity. From one of these Neale extracted the
cento 'O Unity of threefold Light' fi63.

Mention should be made in conclusion of a number of
hymns in E.H. taken from the Greek service-books, of
which it is impossible to assign the author or even with
any certainty the date. They are as follows : 'Behold, the
Bridegroom cometh' (f3=*64i), from the Ferial Midnight
Office at the beginning of the Horologion ; 'O King, en-
throned on high' t454> fr m the Pentecostarion ; 'Thou,
Lord, hast power to heal' t349> fr m the Office of

45

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Anointing ; and two Litanies the Litany of the Deacon,
'Goo of all grace' 1652 and the "Great Colled", 'LORD,
to our humble prayers attend' 1650.

The main defect of Greek hymnody is a "defect of its
quality". The weakness of most modern hymns is a ten-
dency to be unduly subjective, to concentrate on the moods
and needs of the human ego rather than on the splendour
and beauty of GOD and His revelation in Christ. This
weakness the Greek hymns entirely avoid.

The most remarkable characteristic of Greek hymnody (it
has been said 76 ) is its objedtiveness, with which is connected
its faculty of sustained praise . . . This habit of thought has,
however, its disadvantages. By its discouragement of the
development of human emotion, aspiration and benefit the
range of subjects and reflection is narrowed : and in the later
poets the repetition of the same types, epithets and metaphors
issues in sameness, conventional didtion and fpssil thought.
It is impossible to avoid the convi&ion that the great bulk of
Greek hymns would have had a richer value if it had sought
for inspiration in the deep spiritual analysis of St. Paul, or the
interpretation of the changing moods of the soul which are of
such preciousness in the Psalms.

None the less the fundamental "quality" remains : and
these dogmatic, essentially liturgical and profoundly
"Catholic" hymns nobly help in filling a void that is only
too conspicuous in most of our hymn-books.

46

CHAPTER III
LATIN HYMNODY

THE beginnings of Latin hymnody are considerably
later than those of Greek. During the first two and a
half Christian centuries Greek, not Latin, was the
liturgical language in Rome and Italy ; while in Gaul and
Africa there is no trace of hymnody before Gonstantine I.
It was not until the fourth century was well on its way that
it began to develop, and then apparently as a deliberate
borrowing of Eastern usage. The earliest experiments in
Latin hymn-writing are associated with the name of St.
Hilary (d. 368), of whom the Spanish liturgist, St. Isidore
of Seville, tells us (c. 633) that he was "the first who
flourished in composing hymns in verse". 77 An unflinch-
ing opponent of Arianism (he earned the title of Malleus
Arianorum), he was exiled to Phrygia by the Emperor
Constantius in 356. For six years he remained in a region
where hymns were in common use : and it was presumably
in imitation of what he found there that he wrote the
earliest Latin hymns of which there is record. In a letter
attributed to him 78 (which, however, is now generally
regarded as spurious) he informs his daughter, Abra, that
he is sending her two hymns of his own composition, for
morning and evening. St. Jerome, too, tells of a liber
hymnorum composed by Hilary. 7 9 Some twenty years later
(as we have already mentioned in passing) the custom of
singing hymns in the churches was definitely initiated in
the West (386) . St. Augustine tells the story, in connexion
with his own delight in these hymns :

What tears did I shed over the hymns and canticles when the
sweet sound of the music of Thy Church thrilled the soul ! . . .

47

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

The Church of Milan had but recently begun to pradise this
kind of consolation and exhortation, to the great delight of the
brethren, who sang together with heart and voice. It was about
a year from the time when Justina, mother of the boy Emperor
Valentinian, entered upon her persecution of Thy holy man
Ambrose, because he resisted the heresy into which she had
been seduced by the Arians. The people of GOD were keeping
ward in the church, ready to die with their bishop. Then it was
that the custom arose of singing hymns and psalms, after the
usage of the Eastern provinces, to save the people from being
utterly worn by their long and sorrowful vigils. From that day
to this it has been retained : and many, I might say all, Thy
flocks throughout the rest of the world now follow our
example. 80

In certain quarters, however, a prejudice against hymns
in worship seems to have lingered a prejudice which we
may conned with the growing authority of the Bible as
against the Tradition that preceded it. St. Hilary found
that in his time the Gauls disliked hymns. 81 In Spain as
late as 561 the Council of Braga decreed that "outside of
the psalms . . . of the Old and New Testament no poetical
composition shall be sung in church" (canon 12). On
the other hand, the Council of Agde (in Gaul) ordered in
506 the daily singing of hymns both morning and evening
(c. 30) : while in 567 the Council of Tours permitted the
use not only of "Ambrosian hymns" but of others as well,
"on condition that the names of the authors are inscribed
at the top" (c. 23). Even in Spain the prejudice against
hymns finally died out: for in 633 the 6th Council of
Toledo decreed : "Let none of you henceforth objecl to
hymns composed in praise of GOD : but let Gaul and Spain
celebrate them alike. They are to be excommunicated
who dare to reject hymns" (c. I3). 82

The Latin hymnody of the West was to assume a very
definite form of its own. But this form was not discovered
quite immediately. To the earliest period, the period of
experiment, belongs the greatest of all Latin non-Scrip-
tural hymns, the Te Deum laudamus. The date and author-

48

LATIN HYMNODY

ship of this were long in dispute : for the story which tells
that it was improvized by St. Ambrose and St. Augustine
when the former baptized the latter is, of course, a mere
legend. But it is now generally held to have been written
by Niceta, missionary Bishop of Remesiana, in Dacia, at
the end of the fourth century; though some recent
scholars allege reasons for believing that the first part of it
is of considerably earlier date. 83 The earliest testimony to
its liturgical use is in the Rule of St. Benedict in the first
half of the sixth century.

The hymn in its original form concludes with the words
"in glory everlasting" ; the subsequent verses being suf-
frages in the form of versicle and response that came to be
appended to it. It is written in prose : but its three
"strophes" are clearly marked and have a very definite
structure, as will be seen from the following setting-out of
it in the original Latin, based on Dr. Burn :

Te Deum laudamus, te Dominum confitemur,

Te aeternum Patrem omnis terra veneratur.

Tibi omnes angeli, tibi coeli et universae potestates,

Tibi Chembin et Seraphin incessabili voce proclamant :

Sanftus, SanEtus, Santtus Dominus JDeus Sabaoth,

Pleni sunt coeli et terra majestatis gloriae tuae.

Te gloriosus apostolorum chorus,

Te prophetarum laudabilis numerus,

Te martyrwn candidatus laudat exercitus.

Te per orbem tenarum santta confitetur ecclesia :

Patrem immensae majestatis,

Venerandum tuum verum et unigenitum Filium,

Sanctum quoque Paraclitum Spiritum.

Tu rex gloriae, Christe, tu Patris sempiternus es Filius,
Tu ad liberandum suscepturus hominem non horruisti Virginis uterum,
Tu, devitto mortis aculeo, aperuisti credentibus regna coelorum,
Tu, ad dexteram Dei sedens in gloria Patris. judex crederis esse
venturus.

Te ergo quaesumus tuisfamulis subveni,

Quos pretioso sanguine redemisti :

Aeternafac cum santtis tuis gloria munerari.

49

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

The Te Deum is a masterpiece that had no successor. In
the hymns of St. Hilary we have a different sort of experi-
ment, not masterly at all but equally unprolific. It was
formerly the custom to attribute to Hilary some seven or
eight hymns that have survived, including the Lenten
Office Hymn Jesu, quadragenariae : but it is now agreed
that none of these can be reckoned as his. In 1884, how-
ever, a MS. was discovered at Arezzo, containing Hilary's
treatise De mysteriis followed by three hymns with the
heading Incipiunt hymni ejusdem "here begin hymns by
the same author". All three are more or less incomplete :
but it is now commonly agreed that all are genuinely from
Hilary's hand. 84 The first two are constructed on an
alphabetic acrostic one among other signs of Eastern
influence. The third is in the metre known as Trochaic
tetrameter the rhythm to which the marching-songs
of the Roman legionaries were set ; and both in form and
thought bears a curious resemblance to the great Pange
lingua in that metre by Venantius Fortunatus, who was
Hilary's successor some 200 years later as Bishop of
Poitiers and wrote his biography. The same metre but
in stanzas of two lines instead of three is also employed
in a very ancient hymn, Hymnum dicat turbafratrum, which
is described as Hilary's in the seventh-century Irish MS.
called the Antiphonary ofBangor. Here there is more dispute
as to Hilary's authorship than in the case of the Arezzo
hymns : but a strong body of opinion pronounces in its
favour. 85 None of these hymns, however, was destined to
pass into general use in the West. They were not really of
the stuff of which popular songs are composed ; but were
rather (as Dr. Frere says) "the work of a pioneer who has
not found the way along which progress is ultimately to
be made". 86

Very different is the case of St. Ambrose (340-397), who
has been described as "the main founder of the original,
simple, dignified, objective school of popular Latin

50

LATIN HYMNODY

hymnody which for so many ages prevailed over the
Roman Empire and is still in use in the Divine Offices all
over Europe". 87 It was to Ambrose, along with the great
monastic leaders (Benedict, Caesarius) of a rather later
period, that the vanquishing of the Western prejudice
against hymns as non-Scriptural was due. His personal
prestige was enormous. He was a man of vast energy and
dauntless courage- it will be remembered how he re-
fused communion to the great Emperor Theodosius until
he had done penance for the massacre of thousands of
innocent persons at Thessalonica. Of noble birth and
eminent at once as leader of men, as administrator and as
theologian (he ranks as one of the four "Western Fathers"),
Ambrose raised his see to a position of such authority that
it has been said by Duchesne that in his time and that of
his immediate successors "the Western episcopate acknow-
ledged a double hegemony : that of the Pope and that of
the Bishop of Milan". 88 It is thus not surprising that his
hymns at once achieved so great a vogue that the Arians
accused him of having "bewitched the people". 89 Their
form was austerely simple and was couched in the metre
called Iambic dimeter whence later hymns framed in
similar fashion came to be called "Ambrosian". 90 The
matter, too, corresponds to the form. As Archbishop
Trench has said :

The passion is there, but it is latent and represt. . . . [There
is] no softness, perhaps little tenderness ; but ... a rock-like
firmness, the old Roman Stoicism transmuted into that nobler
Christian courage which encountered and at length overcame
the world., 81

Of the numerous hymns formerly attributed to St.
Ambrose 92 the authenticity of three is beyond possibility
of cavil : for they are quoted textually by his contemporary
and friend, St. Augustine. These are : a morning hymn,
Aeterne mum conditor', 93 an evening hymn, Deus creator
omnium,* 'Creator of the earth and sky' J4Q ; and a hymn

5 1

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

for the third hour, Jam surgit horn tertia. 95 In regard to a
fourth Augustine's attestation is doubtful : but we have
early and wide evidence from other sources. This is
Intende qui regis Israel, 96 which, with v. i omitted, figures
as the great Christmas hymn, Veni redemptor gentium, 'Come,
Thou Redeemer of the earth' |i4=**ig=*55. To these
four may be added two others which also have very early
attestation, viz. another morning hymn, Splendor paternae
gloriae,^ 'O splendour of GOD'S glory bright' t5 2== * 2
**2, and a hymn for Epiphany, Inluminans altissimus. 98

A second group of eight hymns may also be assigned
with some confidence to St. Ambrose, despite the lack of
such early attestation as is forthcoming in the case of the
first group. Both groups equally form part of the tradi-
tional collection of hymns in use at Milan ; the hymns of
the second group, like those of the first,' are written in
Iambic dimeter and consist of eight verses of four lines
each ; while they exhibit many resemblances in thought
and expression to St. Ambrose's prose writings. Of these
eight hymns one is for Easter, six are for saints' days, while
the eighth, Aeterna Christi munera, 9 'The eternal gifts of
Christ the King', supplies the two hymns bearing that
title found in most Western Breviaries (though, rather
strangely, not in that of Sarum) ; one selection of lines
providing the hymn for Apostles, **8i, *430, |i75, and
another that for Martyrs, **87=*444.

Concerning a third group of hymns four in number
popularly attributed to St. Ambrose there is more
doubt. All are in current use both in the Breviary and in
our English hymn-books. They are : (i), (2), (3) the well-
known hymns for Terce, Sext and None, *g~n **4~6,
t255, 261-2, and (4) the hymn for Virgins, Jesu corona
Virginum, 'Jesu, the Virgins' crown' *455, t I 9 2 ) **95. 100
They form part of the Milanese tradition and resemble
the authentic hymns of Ambrose in metre and style ; but
besides the difference in the number of verses (three or

52

LATIN HYMNODY

four instead of eight) there are external reasons that
militate against our regarding them as his.

Such questions in any case are of secondary importance.
The essential fads stand firm, that not only do we
owe to St. Ambrose the recognition of hymns as an inte-
gral part of the public worship of the Western Church,
but also that it was he who laid down the lines on which
Latin hymnody was mainly to develop in the centuries
succeeding.

Composed (says the accomplished historian of Christian
Latin poetry, Mr. F. J. E. Raby) with the practical aim of
expounding the doctrines of the Catholic faith in a manner
sufficiently simple to capture the imagination of the unlearned,
the hymns of Ambrose possess at the same time the admirable
qualities of dignity, directness and evangelical fervour. . . .
[They] reflect the mind of the great teacher of the Latin
Church." 1

Some 100 hymns survive of the so-called "Ambrosian"
kind the work of Ambrose himself and of his imitators
during the next 200 years. These hymns represent the
staple type of the Latin Office Hymns ; and were to be
distributed broad and wide among the Breviaries of every
part of Western Christendom. "St. Ambrose," says M.
Gastoue, "fixes henceforth a literary and musical form of
which the rhythm and the melodies are easily remem-
bered : the Ambrosian hymn is musically a true type of the
chanson populaire." 102 However little like it they may seem
to our modern ears, these early hymns were in fad genuine
folk-songs, and continued to be so as long as Latin re-
mained a living language. It was only later that they be-
came perforce a "poetry of the church and cloister" : 103
and even then their metrical and verse structure was to
perpetuate itself in the vernacular hymnody of many
lands. What else is the "Long Measure" in which so many
of our hymns are written than the "Ambrosian hymn"
in an English guise ?

53

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

The typical form of these hymns, then, is a series of
verses of four lines each, written in Iambic dimeter. The
metres of classical prosody were now for the most part
abandoned. To some extent, as Archbishop Trench sug-
gests, this may have been because of their association with
Paganism and its preoccupation with the merely finite and
temporal. 104 But the principal reason, no doubt, lay in
the general breakdown, in the decay of the old classical
culture, of the distinctions in the quantity of vowels and of
the metrical structures based upon them. These structures
were even more precarious in Latin than in Greek. The
classical metres were not indigenous in Italy, but had been
introduced as a copying of Greek models. Their scansion
always involved an element of elaboration and artifici-
ality : and, as the domination of the classical tradition
loosened amid the decay of the old Roman polity, a
simpler and more natural type of prosody (which no doubt
had existed all along in the songs of the people) began to
assert itself a prosody based not on quantity but on
accent. 105 In this connection it must be remembered that
the hymns of the Church were not written for the literary
delectation of the cultured few, but to meet the devotional
needs of the people. Thus it was natural that these hymns
should conform more and more to the new type of accen-
tual versification : and the triumph of this was assisted by
the ease with which its simple and obvious metrical struc-
tures could be made to serve the purposes of congrega-
tional singing. Along with this substitution of accent for
quantity went another change the introduction of
rhyme. This is not yet present in the authentic hymns of
Ambrose : but it is found in hymns of a slightly later date.
"It was," says Archbishop Trench, "the well-nigh instinc-
tive result of the craving after periodic recurrence, propor-
tion, limitation, the desire to mark and make distinctly
noticeable to the ear those limits and restraints which the
verse, for its own ultimate good, imposes upon itself." 106

54

LATIN HYMNODY

In a classical metre like the hexameter this object had been
secured by the fixed dactyl and spondee at the end of a
line : in the accentuated verse the same purpose of mark-
ing the close was achieved by the use of rhyme. "Indeed,"
as Dr. Guest pointed out long ago, "no people have ever
adopted an accentual rhythm without also adopting
rhyme." 107 A further recommendation of rhyme, especi-
ally in a day when books were scarce and costly, was the
assistance that it lent to memory.

The example of Ambrose determined not only the form
of Latin liturgical hymnody but its spirit as well. It is a
spirit grave, severe, and giving little scope for the poetic
imagination to soar. Alike to the student of pure letters
and to the connoisseur in religious emotions, these ancient
hymns of the Church will appear as somewhat of a valley
of dry bones. Their rugged and often pedestrian diction is
wedded to an uncompromising practical morality and to
an austerely objective concentration on the dogmas and
mysteries of the Faith. "These solemn old hymns," says
Dr. Bigg, "are strong because they are not the outpouring
of individual emotion but an attempt to realize the
majesty of GOD." 108 They represent the reaction of
ascetic Christianity from the license and frivolity of
Paganism, the "purging out of the old leaven" that had
to precede the return of a now sanctified gaiety to the
world iii the joyous carollings of the Franciscan revival. 109
Their analogues in the world of art are the stern and
massive outlines of Romanesque architecture and the
stiff, grim, almost intimidating mosaics that stare at the
beholder from the apses and friezes of the churches of
Ravenna. In poetry and art alike we are conscious of a
failure of the old technique : but this is not the whole
secret of the change there is an element of deliberate
choice as well. The essential quality of both is hieratic : they
breathe the spirit of the great and austere pontiffs and
abbots who were rebuilding the old imperium of Rome into

E 55

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a new shape and so laying the foundations of the mediaeval
Church.

This does not mean that the Christian poetry of the age
between Ambrose and Gregory the Great was incapable
of clothing itself in a more genial and imaginative guise.
Indeed the most famous writers of hymns in order of time
after Ambrose was a poet of very different calibre. But
Prudentius was hardly in intention a hymn-writer at all.
His poems were to contribute considerably to the hym-
naries of the Western Church, but only after undergoing
a process of selection and abbreviation. Rather, he was a
Christian lyrist of the same kind as George Herbert and
John Keble. His purpose is not to provide a vehicle of
liturgical devotion, but to voice the sentiments evoked in a
pious and meditative soul by a contemplation of the
mysteries and practices of the Faith and the achievements
of its heroes. In their original form his poems are too long
to be suitable for use as hymns. They are also framed too
closely on the model of the classical tradition, the metres
of which they employ in considerable variety ; though
even here we see the vanquishing of quantity by accent in
frequent violations of correct usage such as e.g. delibutus
and margaritum. Within his own rather restricted limits,
. Prudentius is a genuine poet, with real qualities of grace
and tenderness mingled with a kind of "fairy-tale"
romanticism. Dr. T. R. Glover even goes further and
describes him as "the first really great Christian poet" ;
and adds : "The more one studies his contemporaries, the
more one admires him. Spiritually and intellectually he
far outstrips the heathen poets, and in poetic insight, grace
and mastery of his materials he is far above the Chris-
tians." ! ! But for this very reason he lies outside the main
current of early Western hymnody.

What little information we have concerning Prudentius
is derived from his own writings. Born c. 348, he was a
native of northern Spain, and after practising at the Bar

56

LATIN HYMNODY

entered the civil service, in which he rose to a position of
some importance. In his 57th year he retired and devoted
himself henceforth to using in the service of Christ the
poetic faculty with which he was endowed. He himself did
not overrate this. In the preface to the Peristephanon he
writes as follows (I use Dr. Glover's beautiful translation
with his permission) :

Yet has Christ a need of me,
Though but a moment's space I have my station ;

Earthen vessel though I be
I pass into the Palace of Salvation.

Be the service ne'er so slight,
GOD owns it. Then, whatever Time is bringing,

This shall still be my delight
That Christ has had the tribute of my singing. 111

Not long after his retirement he went to Rome to pre-
sent some petition to the Emperor Honorius. The journey
he turned into a pilgrimage, visiting every famous shrine
on the way and in Rome itself. The fruit of his experiences
was the collection of 14 poems called Peristephanon or
'Martyr-Garlands'. These display a true Spaniard's love
of the saints and of the gory details of their martyrdoms,
besides throwing much light on the devotional practices of
the age. Another collection of 12 poems is called Cathe-
merinon, The Christian's Day,' and deals with the duties
and observances of the devout life. It is from these books
that the hymns of Prudentius are derived which have
passed into liturgical use. His other poems are didaclic
theological treatises, written in passable hexameters, and
need not concern us here.

In the curtailed form in which they appear in the Latin
Breviaries a number of Prudentius's poems have been
translated into English and are widely used. The finest of
all, perhaps, is the grand, rolling Christmas hymn in
Hilary's Trochaic tetrameter, Corde natus, 112 'Of the
Father's love begotten' *56 ** 146=1613. The refrain

57

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Saeculorum saeculis, 'Evermore and evermore,' is not part
of the original, but was added when it was adapted for
liturgical use. Other familiar hymns of his are sola
magna urbium, 'Earth hath many a noble city' * 76=140,
and the hymn for Holy Innocents, Salveteflores martyrum, 1 * 3
'Sweet flow'rets of the martyr band' *68=f 34. The Latin
versions of these are both centos from no. 12 in the
Cathemerinon, beginning Quicunque Christum quaeritis,
Another well-known hymn from Prudentius is the Sarum
Compline hymn for Passiontide, Cultor Dei memento , 114
'Servant of GOD, remember' f 104 **45- This is part of no.
6 of the Cathemerinon, of which another cento, Ades Pater
supreme, is the original of 'Father, most high, be with us'
*493 (with its lovely tune from the German collection of
1533 called Melodiae Prudentianae] . In addition, E.H. pro-
vides translations of the three Breviary Office hymns for
use at Lauds, Ales diet nuntius, u& 'The winged herald of
the day' f53 ; Nox et tenebrae et nubila, 11 'Ye clouds and
darkness, hosts of night' ^54 ; Lux ecce surgit aurea, 111 'Lo !
golden light rekindles day' f 55 ; together with a hymn for
Martyrs, Beate Martyr, prospera, 'Blest Martyr, let thy
triumph-day' f 1 ^, and the more elaborate and philo-
sophical hymn for the departed, Deus ignee fans anim-
arum, ll& 'Father of spirits, Whose Divine control' J352.
This last was described by Archbishop Trench as "the
grandest of them all".

Two contemporaries of Prudentius have contributed to
our hymn-books. One is St. Paulinus of Nola (353-431),
the gentle and humble patrician of Gaul who, to the
distress of his old teacher Ausonius, forsook the world and
retired to Spain, thence to remove later to Nola in
Campania, where he ended his days as parish priest of the
shrine of Nola's saintly bishop Felix. Paulinus was devoted
to Felix's memory and wrote every year a poem to help
pilgrims to honour it. An excerpt from one of these poems
beginning Ecce dies nobis is the original of 'Another year

58

LATIN HYMNODY

completed' t J 95- The other poet is [Caelius] Sedulius,
who wrote about the middle of the fifth century. We know
little about him : but it would appear that he remained a
pagan until his later years and was subsequently ordained
priest. Among other poems he wrote a long one in Iambic
dimeter on the life of Christ called Paean alphabeticum de
Christo and beginning A soils ortus cardine. 119 This is
written in the form of an alphabetic acrostic : e.g. the
2nd verse begins Beata auftor saeculi, the third Clausae
puellae viscera, and so on. A cento of this is the original of
the Christmas Office hymn, 'From east to west, from shore
to shore' *483 |i8 **20 : but the translation does not pre-
serve the alphabetic scheme. Another cento from the same
poem (beginning with v. 8) is the Epiphany Office Hymn,
Hostis Herodis impie, 'How vain the cruel Herod's fear'
*75 **29=f38. Both of these were in general use in
the Western Breviaries.

Passing from the fifth to the beginning of the sixth
century we may notice in passing Ennodius, Bishop of
Pavia (473-521). A number of what Mr. Walpole calls
his "laboured and unpoetical" hymns 12 have survived :
but none is the original of any English hymn. Of more
interest is his contemporary Elpis, said to have been the
wife of the famous philosopher Boethius. 121 She is re-
putedly the author of the Office Hymn for St. Peter and
St. Paul, Aurea luce et decore roseo, 'With golden splendour
and with radiant hues of morn' J226, which, if this doubt-
ful attribution be correct, has the distinction of being the
only Office Hymn written by a woman. Both these names,
however, pale into insignificance beside that of another
hymn-writer of the second half of the same century,
Venantius Fortunatus, author of several of the most
famous among Latin hymns.

Fortunatus was born c. 530 at Treviso in northern Italy.
While a student at Ravenna he was threatened with
blindness : but his sight was restored (as he believed)

59

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

through the application of oil taken from the lamp that
burned before the altar of St. Martin of Tours in a
Ravennese church. This led him to go on pilgrimage to
the saint's shrine at Tours : and in Gaul he remained for
the rest of his days "a kind of halcyon on the dangerous
Prankish seas", to borrow Miss Helen WaddelPs charming
description of him. 122 At first he journeyed here and there
in leisurely fashion, visiting the houses of the great, whose
hospitality he repaid by writing graceful trifles in verse,
and following for a time the royal train of King Sigebert
of Austrasia. But in 567 he met the fascinating ascetic,
Rhadegunda, Glotaire of Neustria's "reluclant queen",
who had retired to Poitiers and founded a monastery
there. Captivated by her spiritual charm he settled down
by her side and later became a priest. He was finally made
Bishop of Poitiers, c. 598, and died a few years later.

The poetical work of Fortunatus varies widely both in
quality and in range. Trench speaks of him as "one of the
last who, amid the advancing tide of barbarism, retained
anything of the old classical culture". 123 But his is a
decadent classicism it could hardly be otherwise:
indeed Mr. Raby prefers to regard him "not as the last of
the Roman but as the first of the mediaeval poets". 1 - 24
In his troubadour days, as we have said, he composed a
good deal of light verse : but later he consecrated his muse
to religious subjects, in treating which he rose, at his best,
to heights of genuine inspiration, being sometimes rugged
and grand, sometimes lilting and fanciful and gay. In the
former manner his greatest achievement is the Passiontide
Office Hymn at Vespers, Vexilla Regis prodeunt, 125 'The
Royal banners forward go' *g6 J94 **44, written after
the "Ambrosian" fashion in Iambic dimeter in verses of
4 lines. This famous hymn is said to have been composed
on the occasion of the solemn reception of a relic of the
True Cross which the Emperor Justin II had given to
Rhadegunda for her convent of Sainte Croix at Poitiers

60

LATIN HYMNODY

(Nov. 19, 569). Certainly its stately processional move-
ment well befits such a solemnity ; and explains too the
immense popularity which the hymn, wedded to its
superb plainsong melody, enjoyed at the time of the
Crusades. In Neale's translation (more or less altered) it
finds a place in most Church hymnals : but a far finer
version is that which appeared in Walter Blount's Roman
Catholic manual, The [Compleat] Office of the Holy Week
(1670 and 1687). A much altered form of this was
included in The Office of the Blessed Virgin Mary (1687),
from which it was adopted by Church Hymns (1903) and
the Oxford Hymn Book. But the original form is far superior
and, as it is very difficult of access, is here reprinted :

Abroad the Regal Banners fly ;
Now shines the Crosses mystery :
Upon it life did death endure,
And yet by death did life procure.
Who, wounded with a direful spear,
Did, purposely to wash us clear
From stain of sin, pour out a flood
Of precious water, mixed blood.
Fully accomplisht are the things,
David, in faithful Meeter, sings :
Where he to nations does attest,
GOD on a tree his reign possest.
O lovely and refulgent tree,
Adorn' d with purpled majesty ;
CulPd from a worthy stock, to bear
Those limbs which sanctified were.
Blest tree, whose happy branches bore
The wealth, that did the World restore :
The beam, that did that body weigh,
Which rais'd up Hell's expedled prey.
Hail Gross, of hopes the most sublime,
Now in this mourning Passion-time ;
Improve religious souls in grace ;
The sins of criminals efface.
Blest Trinity, Salvation's spring ;
May every soul Thy praises sing :
To those Thou grantest conquest by
The holy Gross Rewards apply. Amen. 126
61

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Another great hymn by Fortunatus, believed to have
been written for the same occasion, is the Office Hymn at
Martins and Lauds in Passiontide, Pange lingua gloriosi
proelium certaminis, 12 ^, 'Sing, my tongue, the glorious
battle.' This is written in Trochaic tetrameter, and must
be distinguished from St. Thomas Aquinas's hymn with
the same three opening words, which is clearly modelled
on it. It was translated by Neale. His version, much
altered, is used in *g7 **43- (J95 is a mainly new
translation, fg6 Neale's original.) In using the hymn it
is well to remember that v. 2 is based on a purely
legendary story that the tree from which the Gross was
made sprang from a seed of the Tree of Life in the Garden
of Eden, and also that v. 3 in the words

To the traitor's art opposing
Art yet deeper than his own

suggests a mode of presenting the doftrine of the Atone-
ment (sometimes irreverently nicknamed the "mouse-
trap" theory) which has been obsolete for centuries a
criticism that applies to v. 5 of Vexilla Regis as well. A
third hymn by Fortunatus deals with the same subje6l of
the Cross, Crux beneditfa nitet. 128 It is " a beautiful weaving
in of the image of the true Vine with the fact of the Cruci-
fixion." Neale's version in a shortened and considerably
rewritten form appears in **u8, 'Lo! the blest Cross is
displayed.'

In the last-named hymn, written in elegiacs (i.e. alter-
nate hexameters and pentameters) and "full of that strange
and novel beauty with which Christian mysticism was
learning to adorn the measures borrowed from the ancient
world", the other, more picluresque and luxuriant side
of Fortunatus's talent is revealed, notably in the lines
that have been thus translated :

Strong in thy fertile array, O Tree of sweetness and glory,
Bearing such new-found fruit 'mid the green leaves of thy
boughs,

62

LATIN HYMNODY

Stately thou rearest thy head by the streams of the clear-
running waters,

Shedding from flower-deck'd boughs leaves for the healing
of men.

But this side finds its fullest expression in the great Pro-
cessional Proses, beginning Salve festa dies, which were
widely used in the Middle Ages all over Europe and in their
various English forms have won much popularity in the
last generation or so. They are taken from a long'poem in
elegiacs on the Resurrection, beginning Tempora florigero
rutilant distintta sereno. 12 The complete poem paints a
glowing picture of the coming of spring, regarded as a
symbol of the New Life which came to the world with the
rising of Christ from the tomb and as the tribute of Nature
to her triumphant LORD. Though the subject of the poem
thus refers really to Easter, three separate centos are found
in the Sarum Processional for Easter, Ascension and
Whitsunday respectively. The refrain of the first is by
Fortunatus himself, while those of the other two are
adapted to fit the festival they serve. The cento for Whit-
sunday (apart from the refrain) has no reference to the
coming of the Holy Spirit, though it presents a joyous
picture of the countryside in early summer. For this
reason, presumably, a very inferior substitute of much
later date was provided in the York Processional. A.M.
provides a translation of the three Sarum forms in clear-
cut heroic couplets by Dr. A. J. Mason, *650, 652, 653 ;
while P.H.B. supplies a version of the same three in the
elegiacs of the original by the present writer, **i49, 151,
152. It may be noted that the plainsong melody proper to
all the Salves is one of exquisite and haunting beauty,
though some may find it a little deficient in the quality
of joy. E.H. gives the Sarum Proses for Easter and Ascen-
sion, f624, 628, the York one for Whitsuntide, f630.
These are written in the original metre by different trans-
lators, and are wedded to the well-known tune Dr.

63

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Vaughan Williams composed for them. In addition to the
three already mentioned the Sarum Processional provided
Salves for Dedication, Corpus Ghristi, the Visitation, and
the Name of Jesus : but these are of later date and very
inferior, and have nothing to do with Fortunatus. A.M.
and E.H. provide versions of that for Dedication, *747
1634, P.H.JB. of those for Dedication and Corpus Christi,
**i55, 1 6 1 ; though the latter is rather a free treatment of
selected parts of its very debased original than a transla-
tion in the strict sense.

Before leaving Fortunatus, we may add that there
appears to be some reason for attributing to him the
ancient hymn in honour of the Blessed Virgin, Quern terra,
pontus, aether a, 1 'The GOD Whom earth and sea and sky'
*449 J2i4 **io6.

One other name remains to be mentioned at this point

a name among the most illustrious in Christian history

that of Fortunatus' contemporary, Pope Gregory the
.Great (540-604). The services rendered by Gregory to the
codification and reform of the Church's music are beyond
dispute ; even if subsequent generations chose to regard
him as wholly responsible for a work which in fact he only
began and set upon the lines on which it was to run. It
was only natural, therefore, that tradition should assign
to this "most versatile of Popes" a place among the
writers of those Office Hymns (both words and music)
which in his time and after were rapidly winning an
established place in Christian worship. His Benedictine
editors credit him with eight hymns, including several
which in their English guise are in common use to-day
(viz. fso ; the Sapphic f 165=43 5 *8y=t 6 6 5 t6 8 =*8g ;
]-<ji=**7=*38). But none of these attributions rests on
any satisfactory evidence : though (as we shall see) it is by
no means forbidden to believe that the great Pope in-
cluded the writing of hymns among his other accomplish-
ments (see below > p. 7*1).

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LATIN HYMNODY

Of the names that have been mentioned Prudentius is
the only one that does not belong to Italy or Gaul and
he was a hymn-writer only, as it were, by accident. The
prejudice against hymns, we have seen, lingered longer in
Prudentius's native country of Spain than elsewhere. But,
once having come into line, Spain seems to have elecled
to compensate for its late start by a special addition to
hymns and fertility in composing them. Its liturgy
called first 'Old Spanish', then 'Gothic', finally (after the
Arab conquest) 'Mozarabic' was specially rich in
hymns : and the collection of these which it embodied
bears a decided national character. The figure most
prominently identified with this liturgy was St. Isidore
of Seville, who "seems", says Dreves, "to have done
for the Spanish liturgy what Gregory did for the
Roman". 131 "He was a younger contemporary of the
famous Pope (d. 636) and was himself a writer of hymns.
With the obsolescence of the Mozarabic Liturgy, however,
the majority of its hymns were to pass out of use.

Less important in a general way than the Spanish, but
to the English student of greater interest, is another
distinctively national collection that came into existence
about the same time near our own shores in the Celtic
Church of Ireland. Though situated on the furthest out-
skirts of the Christendom of that time, the Church founded
by Palladius and Patrick was to prove second to none in
devotion and missionary ardour. From its earliest days it
would appear to have been fertile in sacred song. The
name of Patrick himself is associated with a celebrated
song called Lorica or "Breastplate". It was not written in
Latin but in Irish : but for convenience' sake something
may be said about it here. Opinion is divided as to whether
it is really his : but the majority of scholars see no reason
why it should not be. 132 It is the best and probably the
earliest of a number of similar "charm-hymns" which
were a Christianized form of the old pagan runes intended

65

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

to ward off evil. An ancient Irish preface 1 33 to it describes
its use :

It is a corslet of faith for the protection of body and soul. . . .
Whosoever shall sing it every day with pious meditation on GOD,
devils shall not stay before him .... It will be a safeguard
against every poison and envy. It will be a defence to him
against sudden death. It will be a corslet to his soul after dying.

The same preface thus describes the occasion of its com-
position :

Patrick chanted this when the ambushes were set against
him by [King] Loegaire that he might not go to Tara to sow
the faith, so that [he and his monks] seemed before the liers-in-
wait to be wild deer.

It is becoming well-known in Mrs. Alexander's translation
'I bind unto myself to-day' *655 jais. (The opening
words of the original really mean 'To-day I arise.') But
a finer though less exacl: version, "preserving", says Dr.
Todd, "the toneand spirit of the original", is that made by
the Irish poet James Clarence Mangan, 134 the author of
that terrible and unforgettable poem, The Nameless One.
Its irregular metrical structure, however, makes it un-
suitable for use as a hymn.

The earliest form of this Lorica is given in the eleventh-
century MS. of the Irish Liber Hymnorum preserved at
Trinity College, Dublin, But hymns are also to be found
in a much older Irish MS. the famous Antiphonary of
Bangor 135 (not the Welsh Bangor, but the Irish Bennchar),
which dates from the end of the seventh century and is the
oldest hymnal MS. in existence. This includes 12 hymns,
of which one is the hymn ascribed to St. Hilary, Hymnum
dicat turba fratrum, already mentioned, and another, in
praise of St. Patrick, is attributed to the saint's friend and
fellow- worker, St. Sechnall. But by far the most interesting
of all is the 8th hymn, Sanfti venite, 136 which has become
celebrated in Neale's translation, 'Draw nigh and take the

66

LATIN HYMNODY

Body of the Lord' *3i3 |3 7- This is shown by its title
to be an Antiphona or Communio ad accedentes, to be used
"when the priests" (of whom there would be many in
an Irish monastery) "make their communion". The
legendary story of its origin is thus given in the thirteenth-
century Irish MS. called the Lebhar Breac, which describes
how Patrick and Sechnall had a quarrel that was ended
by mutual explanations :

So then they made peace : and while they were going round
the cemetery they heard a choir of angels chanting at the offer-
ing in the church, and this is what they chanted, the hymn
whose beginning is Sanffi venite, corpus Christi, etc. Wherefore
from that time forward this hymn is sung in Ireland when one
goes to Christ's Body. 137

In S.P, a mangled version of Neale's translation (|s68)
is set to a singularly lovely old Irish melody appropriately
christened 'St. Sechnall'.

Among the Irish saints the next most famous after
Patrick, the great St. Columba, was also a sacred poet.
His hymn, Altus Prosator (in reality rather a "cosmogonical
and eschatological poem"), is an alphabetical composition
of 24 stanzas and is to be found in the Irish Liber Hymn-.
cram. 138 The significance of its ancient preface describing
how it was written in return for a gift of "Hymns for the
Week" sent by Gregory the Great will be considered in
the next chapter. Had this gift anything to do with "the
book of hymns for the week" written by the hand of
Columba, concerning which his biographer, Adamnan,
has a story to tell? Adamnan tells, too, how after the
saint's death, "the mattins hymns being ended", his body
was borne into the church. 139

67

CHAPTER IV
LATIN HYMNODY (continued]

WE have examined the beginnings of Western
hymnody and passed in review its leading ex-
ponents between the fourth and the seventh cen-
turies. We have now to trace the process by which hymns
were not only constituted an integral part of the Church's
services but came to be arranged in an ordered sequence
for use at different times and seasons. It should be under-
stood that hymns for a long time had no place in the
Eucharist. The sung portions of the Mass were confined
to Scripture (mainly to the psalms) and to such quasi-
Scriptural unmetrical texts as the Sanffus and (later) the
Gloria in excelsis, with the Greed. It was in connection with
the Hour-services, which by the end of the fourth century
were well on the way to becoming a regular institution in
the larger churches, that hymns established themselves as
a normal element in Divine worship. The evolution of
these services was greatly stimulated by the monastic
movement that spread rapidly over Western Europe
during the fifth century and found its patriarch and law-
giver in St. Benedicl in the sixth. It was then that the seven
"Canonical Hours" assumed their permanent shape in the
following sequence : ( i ) the night-service called Notturns
(later called Mattins], followed by Lauds at daybreak;
(2) Prime in the early morning ; (3), (4), (5) Terce, Sext and
None, at 9, 12 and 3 respectively; (6) the evening service
called Vespers ; (7) Compline, before retiring to rest. Of all
these services hymns formed a part : and the Rules of St.

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LATIN HYMNODY

Benedict (530) and of others gave explicit directions to
this effect.

The tracing of the successive stages in the assignment of
specific hymns among these various Offices is a compli-
cated and technical question which it is impossible to deal
with adequately within the limits of this book. Those who
are interested in the subject are referred to Dr. Frere's
lucid and detailed treatment of it in the Introduction to
the Historical Edition of Hymns A. and M. uo It must suffice
to summarize briefly the conclusions there advanced.

The earliest cycle of hymns for the different Offices of
the week was the creation of the monasteries and was well-
known in the time of St. Benedict and of his fellow-legis-
lators, St. Gaesarius of Aries and St. Aurelian. Further,
the learned German Jesuit, Father Blume, 141 has shown
that this "primitive monastic" cycle is identical (so far as
it goes) with that found in a group of five of the earliest
existing hymnal MSS., written in the ninth century. In its
earliest form it fell into two parts one for Eastertide, the
other for the rest of the year. We have here the beginning
of that distinction between "Proper" and "Common"
which was later to receive wide extension in regard to all
parts of the services. The hymns of this cycle include all
the five hymns appropriate to the scheme that appear in
the two classes of the hymns of St. Ambrose which are
indubitably his, viz. Jam surgit, Hie est dies, Aeterne rerum,
Splendor paternae, Deus Creator (see above, p. 51). Here
appears, too, the Compline hymn, Christe qui lux es et
dies, 2 'O Christ, Who art the Light and Day' *Q5 |8i
**4i, which thus belongs to the earliest stratum of
Western hymnody. Apart from these the list includes no
hymns that have become familiar in English guise. Later
the cycle was extended to 36 hymns in all by the addition
of a number of hymns for the seasons, 143 which include
for Christmas St. Ambrose's Intends qui r'egis Israel=Veni
Redemptor gentium ; for Easter, Ad cenam Agni providi, 'The

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Lamb's high banquet' *I28 **54=fi25, and Aurora
lucis raft'/fl^, 144 'Light's glittering morn' *ia6 **53=ji23 ;
and (for the first time) a saint's day hymn, St. Ambrose's
Aeternd Christi munera (for Martyrs).

This cycle, however, was comparatively short-lived. It
was presumably brought to England by the Benedictine
St. Augustine of Canterbury, and the three hymns that
appear in the eighth century Canterbury Psalter in the
British Museum "the first English hymnal", as it has
been called are proved by internal evidence to belong
to it. But by the ninth century a new cycle had come into
existence, at first side by side with th^old. For Blume goes
on to show that besides the above-mentioned group of
ninth-century MSS. containing the "primitive monastic
cycle" there is a second, contemporary group, which pro-
vides a cycle that is entirely different. These MSS., unlike
the others, are all of Irish or English origin for which
reason Dr. Frere christens the cycle contained in them the
"Anglo-Irish cycle". Further, it is this new cycle which
forms the nucleus and basis of the hymnal-scheme of all
the subsequent Western Breviaries and of the Roman
Breviary of the present day. It would appear, then, that
by the end of the ninth century the "Anglo-Irish" cycle
had won so complete a victory over its predecessor that
the latter vanished entirely from the field.

The only features common to the two cycles are the
undisputed hymns of St. Ambrose, the Compline Christe
qui lux es and the two Easter hymns, Ad cenam Agni and
Aurora lucis. In the new cycle there appear for the first
time a second Compline hymn, Te lucis ante terminum, 1 * 5
'Before the ending of the day' *i5 ^264. **g, and the
current hymns for Terce, Sext and None, 146 *g-i i **4~6
[255, 261-2, with Jam surgit (Terce) from the earlier cycle
as an "extra". There are also included the ferial hymns
for the various days of the week at Vespers, Mattins and
Lauds 147 (of which E.H. provides versions of the Vespers

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LATIN HYMNODY

and Lauds series, f 49, 51, 58-62 ; 50 (M), 52-7), including
3 by Ambrose and 3 by Prudentius. In the section for
saints' days all the hymns included except one are found
in English versions in E.H., viz. 180, 183, 175 (*43o),
192 (*455), 182 (*756), 191. 148 The last two, written in
Asclepiads and Sapphics respectively, mark the first
appearance of hymns in the old classical metres instead of
the Ambrosian Iambic dimeter.

So far we seem to be on a fairly solid ground of fads.
But when we go on to seek the explanation of this sudden
and complete disappearance of a cycle consecrated by
some four centuries of use, we enter the region of specula-
tion and surmise. The provenance of the MSS. in which
the new cycle is first found suggests that it had its origin
in the British Isles. Blume finds further support for this
theory in a statement made in an ancient Irish preface 149
to St. Columba's hymn Altus Prosator, which represents
the hymn as written in return for a set of hymns "for every
night in the week" sent to the saint by Gregory the
Great. These hymns, it is suggested, are none other than
the hymns for Vespers that appear for the first time in the
"Anglo-Irish cycle" and may well have been, at least in
part, from the hand of Gregory himself. The suggestion is
ingenious and interesting ; though of course it falls very
far short of being proved. But we may admit that, if
Gregory really had a hand in the new cycle, this would be
an enormous recommendation of it and would greatly
help its victory over its predecessor at first in our own
islands and then, when it was carried by Irish and English
missionaries to the Continent, all over the West and even
in Rome itself.

As a provision of "ferial" hymns for the week the new
cycle was practically complete from the beginning : and
here it received few additions. A Canterbury hymnal of
the later tenth century, which forms part of the so-called
"Bosworth Psalter" in the British Museum, adds four new

F 71

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

hymns two as summer alternatives to the others at
Mattins and Lauds respectively, the Sapphic hymns,
Node surgentes and Ecce jam, noffiis; 15 and two hymns for
Compline, Jesu redemptor saeculi and Prudentius's Cultor
Dei (see above, p. 58). To these the Sarum Use added two
further Compline hymns, Jesu nostra redemptio and Salvator
mundi : and the six were distributed among different
seasons. All six appear in P.H.B., viz. 9^ (ferial), 23 (Christ-
mas), 41 (Lent), 45 (Passiontide), 58 (Easter), 62 (Ascen-
sion). The Mattins hymn appears, too, in P.H.B. as 'Let
hearts awaken' (3). A.M., too, has all six Compline hymns,
but the Passiontide one follows the alternative cento of
Prudentius's original mentioned above (p. 58). E.H.
contains four of the six Compline hymns (264, 81, 104, 144)
and the Mattins Nole surgentes (165).

It was to meet the requirements of the Church's year
that the original cycle was to undergo a wide and pro-
gressive expansion. Herein, in fadt, lay the special rationale
of the liturgical hymn - "to define" (as Dom Cabrol
says) "the, meaning of feasts or offices and in the concert
of Divine praise to strike the note of the liturgical muse"
not (he adds) in any wise to serve as "a kind of Christian
Psalter", for "the Christian Psalter is the Psalter of
David". 161 The requirements in question were of two
kinds those concerned with the ecclesiastical seasons
and those concerned with Saints' days. At first, with a few
exceptions, provision was made for classes of saints only.
Thus, apart from these exceptions, the earlier division was
into two sections "Proper of Seasons" and "Common
of Saints", to use the later technical terms. In regard to
both of these the development was tolerably uniform all
over Western Europe. But later the small group of indi-
vidual saints recognized at first swelled into a vast multi-
tude, whose claim to separate recognition produced a third
division "Proper of Saints." Here local considerations
largely held sway : and there is a wide range of variation.

72

LATIN HYMNODY

It is obviously impossible to deal with all the hymns
that appear under these various categories in the
mediaeval hymnals of Europe. Our concern here is only
with the English Uses ; and especially with those hymns
that have won a vernacular currency in our modern
English hymn-books. Even so we shall not inflicl: on the
reader's patience what would be little more than a dry
catalogue of hymns. Those who are sufficiently interested
in the subject are referred to the lists in Appendix B at the
end of the volume, where the development of the scheme
of English Office Hymns is summarily set forth, so far as
the "Common of Seasons", the "Proper of Seasons" and
the "Common of Saints" are concerned, together with the
provision made for the most important feasts of individual
saints. The list is arranged in three parallel columns, con-
taining (i) the hymns in the Anglo-Irish cycle, (2) the
Office Hymns prescribed in the tenth-century "Canter-
bury Hymnal" mentioned above, (3) the Office Hymns
in the Sarum Breviary. The few hymns found in the
Primitive Monastic Cycle which survived into these later
lists are indicated by the letters P.M.

An examination of these lists will show that most of the
hymns in the Canterbury Hymnal were retained in the
Sarum books, though a certain number dropped out:
while, on the other hand, additions were made, most of
them presumably hymns written since the earlier list was
compiled. The most striking omission is the beautiful
"farewell to Alleluia" Alleluia duke carmen, 'Alleluia,
song of sweetness' *8a f63 **32 which has won
considerable favour with English congregations in Neale's
version. The singing of this hymn formed part of a set of
quaint and picluresque ceremonies. In the Church of
Toul in north-east France the custom of "burying"
Alleluia in a coffin with full funeral rites was observed as
late as the fifteenth century. But in most places the cere-
monies died out much earlier ; and the hymn disappeared

73

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

with them. 152 In the Mozarabic rite a similar practice
was conneded with the singing of the hymn (also found in
the English Anglo-Saxon hymnals) Alleluia piis edite
laudibus, 153 'Sing Alleluia forth in duteous praise' *2g6
sung in this case not before Septuagesima but on the first
Sunday in Lent. Here again the hymn died out with the
ceremonies accompanying it.

A further development of the English Office Hymns was
due to the emergence of new festivals in the Kalendar.
Chief among these is Trinity Sunday, the observance of
which began in England earlier than elsewhere (the Low
Countries possibly excepted) in the tenth or eleventh
century. About the same time, too, it became customary
to observe the festival of a church's Dedication. This gave
room for the Urbs beata Hierusalem, 'Blessed city, heavenly
Salem' *3g6 fiGg-yo **78 that "rugged but fine old
hymn", as Trench calls it, which is found in the oldest
extant MSS. of the ninth century and is probably con-
siderably older still. 154 In the thirteenth century began
the observance of Corpus Christi (instituted by Pope
Urban IV in 1264), which led to the inclusion of three
hymns written by St. Thomas Aquinas, of which more
will be said shortly. The Feast of the Transfiguration and
that of the Most Sweet Name of Jesus were later still
(XIV th or XV th century).

The same closing centuries of the Middle Ages also pro-
duced a vast crop of hymns in honour of individual saints.
In England, it is true, the number of these was not large :
but abroad (to quote Dr. Frere) "the long row of volumes
of Dreves and Blume, Analetta Hymnica Medii Aevi, show
what immense labour was spent on the Continent in pro-
viding second-rate festivals with third- or fourth-rate
hymns". 155

With such foreign developments we are not here con-
cerned. But even confining ourselves, as we must, to the
provision made in our own country to meet the more out-

74

LATIN HYMNODY

standing liturgical requirements, we are confronted with a
fairly large corpus of hymns one, too, that, as a result
of the Catholic Revival, is copiously if not completely
represented in our Church hymnals. The value of these
ancient hymns in their English dress will be variously
assessed, and largely according to the store that we set by
the idea of historical continuity in the Church's life and
worship. To many the majority of them will appear heavy
and dry and remote from the needs of the modern world.
To others their use, at least in moderation, will be valuable
as a link with -the Ecclesia Anglicana of an earlier day and
also as supplying the objective and dogmatic element that
most modern hymns lack. From the musical point of
view, too, these hymns afford what many will regard as
a welcome opportunity for introducing an element of
plainsong into the services and plainsong in its most
attractive and easily digested form. Many of the plainsong
hymn-tunes are of exquisite and haunting beauty : and
to ears attuned to our latter-day musical idiom they may
hope to make an appeal to which Victorian ears were
mostly insensible. In this connection attention may be
drawn to Mr. J. H. Arnold's admirable little treatise,
The Approach to Plainsong through the Office Hymn.

In any case, in weighing the claims of these ancient
hymns upon our attention and use, due regard must be
paid to the fact that those familiar with them only through
the medium of a translation can form but a very in-
adequate idea of their real quality. For the structure and
genius of the Latin and English languages are entirely
different. To begin with, Latin abounds in deep and
broad vowel-sounds ; while in English (at least of the
"cultivated" variety) the lighter, "thinner" vowels pre-
dominate. Again, Latin words are usually longer than
their English equivalents, with the result that a translation
lacks the rolling sonority of the original. It is this grand
polysyllabic quality that makes Latin so incomparable as

75

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a liturgical language. No doubt our Book of Common
Prayer has an immense literary beauty of its own : but the
predominance of short words makes it a different sort of
beauty from that of the Latin services. Compare the effect
of the following clauses from the Gloria in excelsis in Latin
and English respectively :

Laudamns te, benedicimus te, adoranms te, glorificamus te, gratias
agimus tibi propter magnam gloriam tuam.

Here we have 15 .words, of which only 4 are mono-
syllables.

We praise Thee, we bless Thee, we worship Thee, we glorify
Thee, we give thanks to Thee for Thy great glory.

Here are 21 words, of which no less than 18 are mono-
syllables.

The same difficulty occurs in the case of hymns ; but
with the additional disadvantage that, in order to repro-
duce the line- and verse-structure of the Latin, it is neces-
sary to make up for the shortness of the English words by
a continual "padding" of the sense. This is even allowing
for the fact that in English the grammatical "persons" and
"cases" are represented by pronouns and prepositions
respectively and not by inflections a characteristic
which in itself increases the monosyllabic effect. Take e.g.
verse i of one of the most famous Latin hymns, setting it
side by side with the English translation : -

Jesu dulcis memoria, Jesu ! the very thought is sweet ;
Dans vera cordis gaudia : In that dear name all heart-joys meet.
Sed super mel et omnia But oh ! than honey sweeter far
Dulcis eius praesentia. The glimpses of Thy presence are.

Here are 15 words in the Latin to 26 in the English, with
4 monosyllables in the former and 2 1 in the latter. Further,
in line i 'very' is a makeweight, in line 2 'in that dear
Name' is a repetition, while in lines 3 and 4 'far' and 'the

76

LATIN HYMNODY

glimpses of are additions which involve the total sacrifice
of et omnia. Let it be added that all this is not intended to
cast the slightest reflection on Neale's version. It merely
serves to emphasize the obvious fact that the particular
quality of the Latin original largely (however inevitably)
evaporates in translation and all the more when we
add to the other handicaps the loss of the booming Latin
vowels. Experto crede !

Nor is this all. If Latin is more imposing in effect, it is
at the same time easier to manipulate. The order of words
in an English sense is with rare exceptions the "natural"
order of "subject, verb, object". But in Latin it may be
largely varied at the will of the writer. It is this, inciden-
tally, that helps to give Latin its epigrammatic, "lapidary"
quality which is one among other reasons why such a
composition as the Lauda Sion is virtually untranslatable.
Again, in the case of the mediaeval Latin hymn-writers
the sense of verbal "flow" is assisted by the less emphatic
stress of the accentuation a quality that has been
inherited by the Romance languages derived from Latin.
One of the greatest difficulties of the Englishman in learn-
ing to speak French well is to acquire the characteristic
"evenness" of its accentuation. It has been reasonably
argued that it was the desire to obviate still further a "jog-
trot" effect that prompted the repeated assignment in
plainsong of the "neums" or note-groups to the weak and
not to the strong syllables. The result seems strange to our
ears when these melodies are sung to those English trans-
lations which in this and other respects stretch them on a
"Procrustean bed". A further consequence of this less
marked accentuation is the license given to the mediaeval
hymn-writer (and frequently used by him) to indulge in
what modern prosody (like that of classical Latin) would
describe as flagrant "false quantities". E.g. line 2 of the
ancient Easter hymn, Aurora lucis, runs thus :

Coelum laudibus intonat.

77

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

which is as though an English poet were to scan 'radiance'
as 'radiance'.

Such, then, are the largely insuperable difficulties in the
way of him who would translate these old Latin hymns
into tolerable English verse. They do not indeed make his
task futile : for many hymns that have won great and well-
deserved popularity are of this sort. But such hymns must
be judged on their own literary merits, which are bound
to be in great measure different from the merits of the
originals. And if no decent version exist, it is better to
forego the use of a hymn altogether, however ancient and
venerable it may be in the language in which its author
wrote it. Many of the translations in the mid-Victorian
Anglo-Catholic hymnals do credit to the respecl: for
antiquity of those who wrote and sang them. They say
less for their literary taste.

ii

Of the Office Hymns that we have been describing the
vast majority are anonymous. Even the date of each is
largely a matter of conjecture. It is obvious that any hymn
must be at least as old as the date of the MS. in which it
first makes its appearance. An early date seems to be
indicated by the inclusion of a hymn in the traditional
"Ambrosian" collection at Milan ; and also by the style of
versification, if this is mefrical rather than accentual. But
further than this we cannot go. In regard to a small
minority, however, it is possible to name the author. Of
these authors some have been already spoken of those
who lived up to the end of the sixth century. We may now
say something concerning those who lived subsequently
to that date.

The earliest of these in order of time is an Englishman,
the Venerable Bede (673-735). Besides the York Office
hymn at Mattins for Ascension, Hymnum canamus gloriae,
'Sing we triumphanthymns of praise' fi46**6i, anumber

78

LATIN HYMNODY

of other hymns by him survive, of which two are becoming
familiar in English : the lilting hymn for Holy Innocents,
Hymnum canentes gloriae, 'The hymn for conquering martyrs
raise' j"35, and a hymn written in honour of St. John the
Baptist, Praecursor altus luminis, ' The great forerunner of
the morn' *4i5=J225. Historian, biographer, exegetist,
philosopher, mathematician, as well as sacred poet,
Bede was the greatest scholar of his time in Europe
a living encyclopaedia of all the learning of his age.
His whole life was passed in a monastery first at Wear-
mouth and then at Jarrow. Yet he was in touch with all
the events of his time ; and in this way was able to collect
the materials of the work on which his fame chiefly rests
his great Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation. At the
end of this he gives a list of his own works, which includes
"A Book of Hymns in several sorts of metre or rhyme."

In the later part of the eighth century Western Europe
passed from the darkness and brutality of the Merovingian
period into the comparative sunlight of the so-called
"Carolingian Renaissance", which found its centre in the
court of the Emperor Karl the Great (or "Charlemagne")
and its famous "palace school", with the great English
scholar Alcuin at its head. Alcuin himself was a sacred
poet : and the majority of his circle seem to have practised
hymn-writing, though not apparently to any marked
extent perhaps (as Dreves suggests) owing to the fact
that the Roman liturgy, which at this time was spreading
rapidly throughout the West in place of the old local rites,
had not yet admitted the use of hymns. 156 Even Charle-
magne himself has been numbered among hymn-writers,
by the attribution to him of Veni Creator Spiritus : but this
is no longer taken seriously. Three poets, however, who
at various times came within his orbit are worthy of
mention. _.

The first is the Italian Paul the Deacon (?730-?7Q9).
He had been tutor to a Lombard princess, and after the

79

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

fall of the Lombard monarchy in 774 entered the cele-
brated monastery of Monte Gassino. The total loss of his
property led him to make appeal to Charlemagne, who
as the price of granting his suit insisted on his bringing
his poetic gifts to adorn his own court. Later he was
allowed to return to Monte Cassino, and wrote his History
of the Lombards. He is reputedly the author of the Sapphic
hymn in honour of John the Baptist, Ut queant laxis, 'Let
thine example, holy John, remind us' f 223=**! 08,
though his authorship has been questioned. 157 This
hymn is of special interest to musicians because the tune
associated with it provided the "sol-fa" nomenclature of
the notes of the scale. The tenth century musical theorist,
Guido of Arezzo, observed that the half verses of this
melody began in turn with these notes in an ascending
order, thus :

Ut que - ant lax - is Re - son - a -

i

i^J* TTl JEH

Mi - ra gest - or - um Fa - mu - '.

- or - um

H

Sol-ve pol- lu -ti La -bi - i re - a - turn Sane- te Jo -han-nes

He therefore named these notes by the syllables on which
they fall in the hymn, and (with the addition of si, and with
do sometimes substituted for ut) they are in use to this day.

A younger contemporary of Paul was St. Theodulph of
Orleans, author of the Palm Sunday hymn, 'All glory, laud,
and honour', concerning which more is said below. But
the best-known name in Garolingian hymnody is that of
Hrabanus Maurus 158 (c. 776-856). Brought up at the great
monastery of Fulda, he studied at Tours under Alcuin,
returning later to Fulda to become head of the monastery

80

LATIN HYMNODY

school. He became Abbot in 822, then (847) Archbishop
of Mainz. The two Office Hymns for Michaelmas, Tibi,
Christe, splendor Patris, 'Thee, O Christ, the Father's splen-
dour' J24i=** 1 19, and Christe, santtorum decus angelorum,
'Christ, the fair glory of the holy angels' J242=**i2i,
have been attributed to him, as well as that for the Purifi-
cation, Quod chorus vatum, 'All prophets hail thee' |2o8=
**ioi : but there is considerable doubt in each case. 159
On the other hand, there are cogent grounds for solving
definitely in his favour the vexed question of the author-
ship of one of the most famous of all hymns, Veni Creator
Spiritus, 16 which has been ascribed to a number of
writers, including not only Charlemagne but St. Ambrose
and St. Gregory the Great.

Of the Veni Creator there are a number of translations
into English. The best-known is the beautiful 'Come,
Holy Ghost, our-souls inspire' *I57 t x 53 **^5, by Bishop
John Cosin (1564-1672). This appeared for the first time
in his Collection of Private Devotions in the Ancient Church
(1627), and was later accorded the honour of inclusion in
the services for the Ordination of Priests and the Consecra-
tion of Bishops in the Prayer Book of 1 66 1. It is, however,
rather a "skilfully condensed paraphrase" than a trans-
lation in the strict sense. Another paraphrase, but far
from condensed, is provided for alternative use in the
same services, 'Come, Holy Ghost, Eternal GOD' *5o8.
This, in dull Common Measure, is a very pedestrian affair
and is considerably more than twice the length of the
original. It appeared (in rather a different form from the
present) in both the Ordinals of Edward VI. Closer trans-
lations than either of these are that by Robert Bridges,
'Come, O Creator Spirit, come' fi54, and one based on
Caswall, 'Come, Holy Ghost, Creator blest' *347 **66.
Dryden's 'Creator Spirit, by Whose-aid' "[156, is another
expanded paraphrase : but it is a good one of its kind, and
its eighteenth-century style and its shape (6 lines instead of

81

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

4) make it an appropriate vehicle for Attwood's elegantly
beautiful tune, written for Cosin's version for use at an
Ordination in St. Paul's in 1831. The plainsong melody
(probably the most familiar of all such melodies to
English ears) has been associated with the hymn since the
latter's first known appearance, but is itself older than the
hymn and was previously used for an Easter hymn by St.
Ambrose. 1 6 1

In addition to his own reputation as a hymn- writer
Hrabanus Maurus is further interesting as supplying the
link between Charlemagne's "palace-school" and the
famous poetical and musical "School of St. Gall", which
will be mentioned in more than one connection in these
pages.

By the eleventh century the cycle of Office Hymns was
tolerably complete, so far as the provision made for the
major requirements of the Church's year was concerned.
We need only mention three more writers, all represented
in our English hymnals. St. Fulbert of Chartres, author
of the Easter hymn, Chorus novae Hierusalem, 'Ye choirs of
new Jerusalem' fi22=**52=*i25, was a distinguished
scholar and poet, who became Bishop of Chartres c. 1007
and died in 1028. Of him Mr. Raby has said that "he
made the cathedral school [of Chartres] the intellectual
glory of eleventh-century France.. . . . He exercised a
magical influence over his pupils. Alike as Master and as
Bishop he was pre-eminent in his generation". 162 Philippe
de Grevia (d. 1236), Chancellor of the church of Paris,
wrote the long hymn Collaudemus Magdalenae, 'Sing we
all the joys and sorrows' J230-i=Jm (abbreviated),
assigned by Sarum in three portions to St. Mary Magda-
lene's day. The last, the great St. Thomas Aquinas, will
be dealt with in the next seclion when we come to speak
of his Sequence for Corpus Christi, Lauda Sion. A word
may be added concerning another famous hymn, Jesu
dulcis memoria, 'Jesu, the very thought is sweet' *iy7 1238

82

LATIN HYMNODY

**ii5. This was long attributed to St. Bernard of
Glairvaux (1091-1153): but the ascription cannot be
substantiated, and its real authorship remains an un-
solved mystery. 163 In its liturgical form it is a cento taken
from a long poem of over 50 stanzas. The lovely plain-
song melody originally belonged to the Christmas hymn,
Christe Redemptor omniun, f 17 **2i. In the period imme-
diately preceding the Reformation another cento, be-
ginning with the same first line, was adopted in England
as a Sequence at Mass, and in the printed editions of the
Sarum Gradual, issued in 1527, 1528 and 1532, is set to
the beautiful melody known as the 'Rosy Sequence' 1238.
Before concluding this sedion it is necessary to speak of
a number of Latin hymns which do not come within the
category of Office Hymns but have enjoyed wide use and
fame and are familiar in English versions. We have already
spoken of the Processional Proses of Fortunatus and his
imitators, beginning Salve festa dies. Another great pro-
cessional is that for Palm Sunday, Gloria, laus et honor.
This is said to have been written by the distinguished poet
and prelate St. Theodulph, Bishop of Orleans 164 (d. 821)
in the prison at Angers in which he was confined by King
Louis the Pious, and to have been sung by him through
the window of his cell while the King was passing in the
Palm Sunday procession, with the gratifying result that
he was at once set at liberty. The story is apocryphal : but
Theodulph's authorship of the hymn need not be ques-
tioned. The ceremonial attending the singing of it as part
of the Palm Sunday solemnities was minutely laid down
in the mediaeval rites. At Sarum the first four verses were
to be sung by seven boys standing in 'a very elevated
position on the south side of the church'. 165 Neale pro-
duced two translations of parts of the Latin original,
which ran to 39 verses. One, 'Glory and honour and laud',
is in the original elegiac metre and forms the basis of the
version in **i48 (f62i gives an abbreviated version).

83

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

The other, 'All glory, laud and honour' *g8 |622 is in
7.6.7.6., and is that in general use. The familiar modern
tune to this had originally nothing to do with Palm
Sunday, but is that of the German chorale, Valet ich will dir
geben ('Farewell, I gladly bid thee,' The Choral Book)
137). This, a hymn for the dying, was written by Valerius
Herberger in 1613 during a pestilence that devastated the
town of Fraustadt where he lived, the melody being sup-
plied by his precentor, Melchior Teschner. The original
associations of the tune are thus completely different from
those evoked by Neale's "cheerful and festive" hymn.
But hymn-tunes are plastic things : and much depends on
pace and manner of performance.

The joys of the heavenly Jerusalem were a favourite
theme with mediaeval hymn- writers. We have already
spoken of Urbs beata. Less well known but hardly less
ancient is beata Hierusalem, 'O Jerusalem the blissful'
*6o2. This is of Mozarabic origin and maybe traced back
at least to the ninth century. More generally popular than
either are two compositions that were both written in the
twelfth century. One of these, quanta qualia, 'O what
their joy and their glory must be' *235 14^5 **i53, is the
work of St. Bernard's bete noir, the celebrated theologian
Pierre Abelard 166 (1079-1142), at one time the idol of
the schools of Paris. It formed part of a complete hymn-
book that he wrote for the Abbey of the Paraclete, of
which his wife, Heloi'se, was abbess, and was designed for
use at Vespers on Saturday evening. The familiar majestic
tune sung to Neale's version has nothing to do with
Abelard's hymn, but is an adaptation, made to fit the
former in the Hymnal Noted of 1854, from a late plainsong
melody of the seventeenth or eighteenth century which
appears in Aynes's edition (1808) of La Feillee's Methods
de Plain Chant as a setting of a hymn in a different metre
(Alcaics), Regnator orbis. 1 1 Besides Neale's version there
is a beautiful rendering of Abelard's original in Miss

LATIN HYMNODY

Waddell's Mediaeval Latin Lyrics, beginning 'How mighty
are the Sabbaths', which has already been taken over for
use as a hymn by the Clarendon Hymnal.

Of slightly later date than Abelard's poem is the com-
position represented by a well-known quartet of English
hymns : 'Brief life is here our portion,' 'The world is very
evil,' 'For thee, O dear, dear country' and 'Jerusalem the
golden' *225~8 JS? 1 ? 495> 392 3 412. These are taken from
a partial translation by Neale of an immensely long poem
written c. 1145 by a monk of Gluny called Bernard of
Morval or Morlaas (Bernard of Morlaix is certainly
wrong). The original poem was not a hymn at all. It
was entitled De contemptu mundi, l68 and was "a bitter satire
on the fearful corruptions of the age", to which its glowing
pictures of the glories of heaven served as a contrast. It
was written in a lilting metre called the daclylic hexa-
meter, complicated by a rhyming system that made it so
difficult to manage that the author says that only by a
special inspiration could he have maintained it through
so long a poem. The opening line of the whole is scanned
thus :

Hora novissima || tempora pessima |] sunt : vigilemus,

or in a not very successful mid-Viclorian translation :

These are the latter times, |j these are not better times ; || let
us stand waiting.

We have already referred to the new note that came
into Christian song through the influence of St. Francis.
Bishop Creighton has said that "Francis was a poet whose
life was his poem". In his early years he had been a gay
young troubadour : and the troubadour spirit never left
him, though after his conversion it was transfigured and
lifted to a higher plane. Walter Pater and Emile Gebhart
have written of the anticipation of the Renaissance proper
which occurred at the end of the twelfth and beginning of
the thirteenth centuries, "a Renaissance within the middle

85

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

age itself". Of this earlier Renaissance St. Francis was a
genuine produd, though very much after his own fashion.
In him and his first followers the note of joy returned to
Christianity joy in Nature, joy in the simple yet august
sandities of human life and destiny, joy in the all-em-
bracing Love of GOD of which all these are a reflection.
It is the spirit to which Francis himself gave utterance in
his Canticle of the Sun (written in Tuscan), and which in
his followers gave birth to the copious and lovely carol-
literature of the later Middle Ages. The latter is repre-
sented in collections of carols rather than in our hymn-
books : but St. Francis's canticle is becoming known in
Mr. Draper's metrical translation, 'All creatures of our
GOD and King' +439. At the same time in Francis, unlike
other representatives of the Renaissance earlier and later,
the joy is achieved not by ignoring the harsher side of
man's life but by accepting and transcending it. The
troubadour is also the saint of the Stigmata. The power of
Francis to help his suffering fellow-mortals lay precisely
in his perception of the value of suffering, as shown in the
sufferings of Christ and his own joyful self-identification
with them. Thus we are prepared for a second note in
Franciscan hymnody its concentration on the Passion of
the Redeemer and its tragic accompaniments. It is fitting
that the Stabat mater, 'At the Cross her station keeping'
*H7 **47=f 115, should have come (in all probability)
from the pen of a Franciscan lay brother Jacopone da
Todi 169 (d. 1306). It is no less characteristic that the
writer of this poignant portrayal of anguish, human and
Divine, should have been a sort of Brother Juniper a
holy buffoon, "a fool for Christ's sake". A second familiar
hymn on the Passion, In passione Domini, 'In the LORD'S
atoning grief *i05, was written by another Franciscan,
the Doctor Seraphicus St. Bonaventura (1221-74), who
wrote it for an Office of the Holy Cross, it is said, at the
suggestion of King Louis IX of France. Finally, it was a

86

LATIN HYMNODY

French Franciscan friar, Jean Tisserand (d. 1494), who
wrote the Easter hymn Jilii et jiliae, 'O sons and
daughters, let us sing' * 130=1626. This joyous composi;-
tion, "modelled" as it is "on the Provencal cantinella" ', 170
may be regarded as a kind of last flaming up of the
troubadour spirit in Church hymnody before the Middle
Ages expired.

The close of the mediaeval period hardly presents an
impressive spectacle so far as "official" Christianity is con-
cerned. More and more such vital personal religion as it
can show tends to take refuge in those groups of humble,
pious souls who were the real precursors of the coming
Reformation. Among these the "Brethren of the Common
Life" in the Low Countries stand out conspicuous. It was
in this milieu that the author of the Imitatio Christi, Thomas
a Kempis (1380-1471), lived and died. To him there seem
to be good grounds for ascribing the originals of several
hymns in our English books. Of these the best-known is
amor quam ecstaticus, 'O love, how deep, how broad, how
high 3 *i73 J459 **72. Others are En dies est dominica,
' Again the LORD'S own day is here' *35 ; Quisquis valet
numerare, 'If there be that skills to reckon' fsso **i22=
*6ig; Hierusalem luminosa, 'Light's abode' *232 J43 1
**i54; and In domo Patris, 'Our Father's home eternal'

J252. 171

Ill

It has been remarked earlier in this chapter that for a
long time the introdu&ion of hymns into the public
worship of the West was confined to the Breviary Offices,
and that their use was rigidly excluded from the Mass.
When, here too, after the lapse of centuries, they made
their appearance, it was by a side door (so to speak) and
in a specialized shape. During the eighth and ninth
centuries a practice m arose of supplementing the
austerely simple . "Gregorian" chant with phrases and

G 87

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

melodies of a much more ornate character, perhaps derived
from Byzantine sources. These were interpolated into the
existing chants and at first simply involved the attach-
ment of long florid "melismatic" passages to single
syllables of the verbal text. These interpolations were
called Tropes. As, however, such passages were hard
to memorize, a further custom developed of fitting words
to them : so that now we have interpolations not only in the
music but in the text itself. The words thus added were
normally in Latin ; though in France at a later date they
were sometimes written in the vernacular. The earliest
specimens of French popular religious songs were produced
in this way. The melody of the hymn filii et filiae
mentioned above was in its origin that of a Trope sung in
Provengal and inserted in the Epistle for Easter Day, Ab
Madalene un matin, to which the Latin words by Tisserand
were fitted some two centuries later. 173

Such Tropes were largely to die out in time. But in
one position in the Mass they held their ground. Of the
new melodies a special elaboration characterized those
attached to the Alleluia following the Gradual sung be-
tween the Epistle and the Gospel. The final syllable -a,
already protrafted in an ornate vocal flourish or jubilus,
was now further extended by a much longer melody called
Sequela. It was these Sequelae (originally wordless) which
when provided with a verbal text produced the type of
hymn known as a Sequence.

The fitting of words to Tropes appears to have
originated in the ninth century in northern France. But
when through the flight from the Northmen (it is said)
of a monk of Jumieges, who carried his choir books with
him it reached the great abbey of St. Gall in Switzer-
land, the local chroniclers, who were masters of self-
advertisement, claimed it as their own. It is a monk of
St. Gall, Notker surnamed Balbulus (or 'Stammerer'),
whose name is specially connected with the earlier type of

LATIN HYMNODY

Sequences, so-called because, whereas other Tropes were
interpolations, this kind followed the Alleluia. Such com-
positions were at first non-metrical in character, having
to follow the free rhythm of the music to which they were
fitted. But as each phrase of this was wont to be repeated
twice and the practice was "a syllable to a note", the result
was "rhythmical prose in binary form". 174 For this reason
in France Tropes (including the Sequences) were usually
known as "Proses", though in fact they were much less
prosaic than the products of Germany, St. Gall, etc.

These compositions became extremely popular, and
their number rapidly increased in both France and
Germany. In course of time, in addition to new words to
old music, new music came to be composed as well. It is
unfortunately impossible to say which of the St. Gall
Sequences that have survived are to be attributed to
Notker himself. 176 The so-called "Allemiatic Sequence",
Cantemus cunfli melodum, 'The strain upraise' *2Q5 t494> is
usually regarded as his : but this is uncertain. Other
examples of the earlier non-metrical type of Sequence
called after him "Notkerian" are to be seen in English
guise in our hymnals. The most famous is the Easter
Sequence, Vittimae Paschali, 'Christians, to the Paschal
Victim' **56=|i30. This is, incidentally, of great import-
ance in the history of the drama. Its form and character
lent themselves easily to dramatic representation : and its
use in this way helped to originate the later "Mystery-
plays" of the Middle Ages. 176 The authorship is ascribed
to Wipo (d. 1050), a native of Burgundy (or perhaps
Swabia) and chaplain to the Emperors Conrad II and
Henry III. Another early specimen is the Sarum Sequence
for the first Sunday in Advent, Salus aeterna, 'Saviour
eternal' f 10 * * 1 8. This is already found in a Bodleian MS.
of c. 1000. We may mention, too, the Prose for the Holy
Innocents, Sedentem in supernum, 'To GOD enthroned in
heaven' **ia8; the beautiful Christmas Prose, Laeta-

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

bundus, 'Come rejoicing' f22 **24; the Prose for Whit-
suntide, Laudes Deo devotas, 'Sing to GOD your praises'
**68; and that for Martyrs, Mirabilis Deus, 'How won-
drous is GOD' **go. These show graceful French musician-
ship.

As time went on, the practice of fitting words to existing
music gave place to the alternative method of writing the
words first and setting them to music afterwards. It was
only natural that the words should assume a metrical
rhymed structure analogous to that of the Office hymns.
The "binary" form, however, persisted. The character-
istic shape of the later type of Sequence is a stanza of
6 lines falling into two groups of 3. The first 2 lines of each
group rhyme with one another ; while the final lines (the
3rd and 6th of the stanza) rhyme also. To compositions of
this type the word "Prose" was no longer applicable : and
the alternative name "Sequence" became general.

It is this metrical formula that is associated specially
with the name of Adam of St. Victor, 177 the most famous
of the later Sequence-writers. Trench goes further and
calls him "the greatest of the sacred Latin poets of the
Middle Ages". He was certainly among the most prolific,
though it is not easy to decide which of the Sequences
ascribed to him are actually his. Gautier's edition of 1853
credited him with 106 : but in the latest edition by Misset
and Aubry (1900) 178 this number shrinks to 45. Not much
is known about his life. He is described as Brito, which may
mean either a Breton or an Englishman. About 1130 he
entered the great abbey of St. Viclor .on the outskirts of
Paris, where he was a contemporary of the two great
"VMorine" theologians, Hugh and Robert. His death is
variously dated 1172 and 1192. His work is distinguished
by stateliness of versification, skilful rhyming and a re-
markable knowledge of Scripture and its "typological"
application. Several of Gautier's 106 Sequences appear
in A.M. and E.H., of which only those here preceded

90

LATIN HYMNODY

by an asterisk are accepted as Adam's by Misset and
Aubry. Those in A.M. are : for St. Stephen's Day, *Heri
mundus exultavit, 'Yesterday with exultation' *64; for
Evangelists, Jucundare, plebs fidelis, 'Gome, pure hearts, in
sweetest measure 3 *434, and Plausu chorus laetabundo.,
'Come sing, ye choirs exultant' *6si ; for Apostles, *Stola
regia laureatus, 'In royal robes of splendour' *620. The two
last are not in the metre of the original, which is that
described above. E.H. has three : 'Come sing, ye choirs'
j" 1 79, and two others : *Supernae matris gaudia, 'Joy and
triumph everlasting' jsoo written by Robert Bridges
to fit the Genevan Psalm tune 42 and Hierusalem et Sion
filiae, 'Sion's daughters, sons of Jerusalem 5 j 1 ? 2 -

None of Adam's Sequences, however, can compare in
popularity with the Sequence for Whitsunday, Veni,
santfe Spiritus, 'Come, Thou Holy Spirit, come' *i56
**6y 1155. This has been variously attributed, but is
most probably the work of Cardinal Stephen Langton,
Archbishop of Canterbury (d. I228). 179 Another cele-
brated Sequence is that in the Mass of the Dead, Dies irae,
dies ilia, 'Day of wrath, O day of mourning' *3g8 **i43=
"(351 ; though it was not written for this position and was a
long time winning it in general use. It is generally
ascribed to Thomas of Celano, a disciple and friend of
St. Francis, one of the early Lives of whom he wrote. 180
The original version ended with the line 'gere curam mei
finis 1 , the 7th from the end : the remainder being made up
later of verses from the Response Libera me. The current
translation of it is by the Rev. W. J. Irons, who made it
after hearing the Dies irae sung at the Requiem in Notre
Dame for Archbishop Affre of Paris, who was shot on the
barricades during the Revolution of 1848. 181

The same thirteenth century also produced the majestic
and highly dogmatic Sequence for Corpus Christi, Lauda
Sion Salvatorem, 'Praise, O Sion, praise thy Master' **i34.=
. This is the work of the greatest theologian of the

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Middle Ages, St. Thomas Aquinas (? 1227-1 274). 182 At
the request of Pope Urban IV he wrote in 1263 a series of
hymns for the proposed Mass and Office of Corpus Ghristi.
For the former he wrote the Sequence in question, for the
latter the three Office hymns, Pange lingua gloriosi Corporis
tnysterium, 'Now, my tongue, the mystery telling' *3og
** 1 25=1326, Sacris sollenniis., and Verbum supernum prodiens,
'The Word of GOD proceeding forth' *3ii j;33o **i26. A
fifth hymn, Adoro te devote, 'Thee we adore, O hidden
Saviour' *3i2 1331 **i33, is usually ascribed to Aquinas,
but his authorship is not certain. It was not written for
liturgical use, but became widely popular and is not less
so in England in Bishop Woodford's translation.

One more Sequence may be mentioned, beata
beatorum, 'Blessed feasts of blessed Martyrs' *440 f 184,
which belongs to the fourteenth century and is of German
origin. Neither this nor the Dies irae is in the normal later
Sequence form.

The number of Sequences in use at the close of the
Middle Ages was enormous, as may be seen by a glance
at the (by no means complete) list given in Julian's
Dictionary of Hymnology., which fills ten large pages of very
small type. 183 With the increase in number went a grave
deterioration in quality a deterioration that marked
the music as well. "There was," says Dr. Frere, "a mag-
nificence about the earlier rhythmical melodies which
was entirely lacking in the prim and conventional formulas
which made up most of the later Sequence melodies." 184
These considerations helped to sharpen the disfavour with
which Rome had at all times regarded them. The litur-
gical reformers of the Council of Trent decided therefore
to make pradically a clean sweep of them. In the Roman
Missal of 1570 only four were allowed to remain, viz. :
Vittimae Paschali (Easter), Veni sancte Spiritus (Pentecost),
Lauda Sion (Corpus Christi), and Dies irae (Requiem). To
these was added in 1727 a fifth, Stabat mater, which was

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LATIN HYMNODY

turned into a Sequence for the Friday after Passion
Sunday.

IV

We have spoken at considerable length of the heritage
bequeathed to us by the Latin hymn- writers of the Middle
Ages. Our indebtedness to Latin hymnody, however, is
by no means confined to this. Many familiar hymns
"translated from the Latin" represent originals that were
never sung in England at all, but were written on the
Continent by poets of the Roman obedience subsequently
to the Reformation. For in the sphere of hymnody, as in
that of private devotion, the divisions of Christendom are
of small account.

The instinct of the Counter-Reformation, like that of
the Reformation in England, was towards liturgical unity.
The Roman Breviary issued by the Council of Trent in
1568 put an end to the infinite and confusing variety of
the local diocesan Uses. But a century later, and notably
in France, the tendency towards variation once more
asserted itself. The Gallican Church of the reign of Louis
XIV was intensely conscious of its "national" character;
and, while of course remaining in communion with the
Holy See, was by no means unready to show its independ-
ence of it, especially in view of the protracted quarrel
between Rome and the Monarchy that raged at the time.
Further, its leaders were largely men of refined and
scholarly tastes, whose contact with the Court and the
cultivated world made them well aware of the spirit and
the needs of the brilliant age they lived in. To such men
the existing Breviary Offices appeared open to criticism
both in matter and in manner. In particular, the lessons
contained many legends that revolted the rising sense of
historical criticism; while the ancient hymns seemed
barbarous in language and versification. It was these com-
bined motives that led to the appearance at the end of the

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

seventeenth and the beginning of the eighteenth centuries
of what are called the "Neo-Gallican Breviaries". 185 The
earliest of these was issued by Archbishop Harlay of Paris
in 1680. Two others may be specially mentioned : the
Cluniac Breviary (for the use of the great abbey of Cluny
in Burgundy), issued in 1686, and a revised edition of the
Paris Breviary issued by Archbishop Vintimille in 1736.

With these Breviaries we are concerned only in their
hymnological aspect. Even the compilers of the Breviary
of the Council of Trent had felt their sense of elegant
Latinity, formed by the Renaissance, shocked and
affronted by the "barbarism" of the ancient Office Hymns,
and had handled them roughly by way of "improving"
them. In the neo-Gallican Breviaries the more drastic step
was taken of largely abolishing them altogether and pro-
viding new ones. Fortunately a number of accomplished
scholars and versifiers were available to undertake the
task. On the score of craftsmanship the hymns they pro-
duced were much superior, generally speaking, to the old.
At the same time their range of subject was wider, their
mood more subjective, emotional and suited to the age for
which they were written. Thus "they are to be classed
with modern hymns rather than with old hymns, in spite
of their language". 186 The Breviaries containing them
remained in use until far into the nineteenth century : and
it was with them that the earlier English translators (who
were also, generally speaking, the more accomplished)
were specially familiar, particularly after Newman pub-
lished his Hymns from the Paris Breviary in 1838. For this
reason, combined with their more modern outlook, they
figure largely in the English collections. A complete list
of the versions of these hymns in A.M., E.H. and P.H.B. is
given in Appendix C at the end of this volume.

It remains to say something here concerning the leading
figures in this school of hymn-writers and the best-known
among the hymns we owe to them. Prominent among the

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LATIN HYMNODY

contributors to the Paris Breviary of 1680 and the Gluniac
of 1686 were the two brothers de Santeuil. One, Claude
(1628-84), was attached to the seminary of St. Magloire,
the other, Jean Baptiste (1630-97), was a Canon of St.
Viclor (both in Paris) ; for which reason their names were
Latinized into "Santolius Maglorianus" and "Santolius
Vi&orinus" respectively. Of Claude's only one hymn is
represented in our collections : Prome vocem, mens, canoram,
'Now, my soul, thy voice upraising' *i03 f623- His
brother has no less than 10 in A.M., and has particularly
helped to swell the repertory of hymns for Saints' days.
Of his hymns three are particularly popular in English
versions : Divine cmcebas puer, 'The heavenly Child in
stature grows' * 78=146 : and the two for Apostles,
Supreme quales arbiter, the original of Isaac Williams'
splendid 'Disposer supreme' *43i f 1 ?^ an d Coelestis aulae
principes, 'Captains of the saintly band' *432 f 1 ??-

Other contributors to the 1680 and 1686 Breviaries were
Nicolas le Tourneaux (1640-86), author of the Epiphany
hymn, Emergit undis, 'The Son of Man from Jordan rose'
*4&7 ; and Guillaume de la Brunetiere (7-1702), who
wrote a finely dramatic hymn on the Conversion of St.
Paul, Quae gloriosum, 'What cause compelling' **gg=
*405. To the Paris Breviary of 1680 Charles Guiet (1601-
64) contributed Patris aeterni suboles coaeva, original of 'O
Word of GOD above' *395 t 1 ? 1 -

Most of the above hymns found a place in the revised
Paris Breviary of 1736. Chief among the new contributors
to this was Charles Coffin (1676-1749), Principal of the
College Dormans-Beauvais in the University of Paris, of
which latter he became Reclor in 1 718. To him we owe no
less than 19 hymns in A.M., not a few of which have won
wide popularity. We may mention here the two Advent
hymns, Instantis adventum Dei, 'The Advent of our King'
*48 1 1 1, and Jordanis oras praevia, 1 On Jordan's banks'
*5 t9 5 J am desinant suspiria, 'Goo from on high hath

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

heard' *58=f27, and Quae stella sole pulchrior, 'What star is
this ?' *77 1 44, for Christmas and Epiphany respectively ;
two hymns for Septuagesima, Te laeta mundi Conditor,
'Creator of the world' *83=f64, and Rebus creatis nil
egens, 'O GOD, the joy' *48g ; the hymn on St. John
Baptist, Nunc suis tandem, 'Lo ! from the desert homes'
*4i4; the evening hymn, Labente jam soils rota, 'As now
the sun's declining rays' *i3 f 265 ; together with fans
amoris Spiritus, 'O Holy Spirit, Lord of grace' *2o8 f453,
and quamjuvatfratres, 'O LORD, how joyful 'tis to see'
*273=J3g8. These, surely, form a decidedly impressive
list. The hymns on the six week-days of creation in A.M.
(39-44) are also by Coffin.

To the same Breviary Sebastien Besnault contributed
two hymns for the Circumcision, which was not provided
for in the mediaeval series (*7o, *7i fsG). An anony-
mous contribution is the original of the familiar 'Con-
quering kings their titles take', Vittis sibi cognomina,

*i?5t37-
Besides these major Breviaries the French diocesan

Breviaries of the eighteenth century have given a number
of hymns to our collections. Two of these may be men-
tioned. From the Meaux Breviary (1713) comes the
Sapphic hymn, Lapsus est annus, not very worthily repre-
sented by the dull jog-trot of 'The year has gone beyond
recall' *72 ; from the Breviary of Bourges (1734), Pugnate,
Ckristi milites, original of the popular 'Soldiers, who are
Christ's below' *447 J4.8o. The latter has become wedded
in its English form to a French melody of far earlier date.
This first appears in an Office for the Circumcision written
by Pierre de Corbeil, Archbishop of Sens (d. 1222), as the
music of a hymn celebrating the ass that carried the
Blessed Virgin into Bethlehem. 187

The liturgical revival of the seventeenth century in
France even produced new Sequences as well as new
Office Hymns. An example of these is Sponsa Christi, 'Bride

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LATIN HYMNODY

of Christ' *6i8<=J253. It was written by Jean Baptiste des
Contes (1601-79), Dean of Paris, and first appeared in the
Paris Missal of 1665.

There remain to be mentioned the best-known of a
number of hymns of continental Roman Catholic origin
derived from various sources. Deus, ego amo te, 'My GOD,
I love Thee' *io6 fSo, is usually attributed to the great
Jesuit missionary, St. Francis Xavier (1506-52) ; but it
seems to be really a Latin translation of a Spanish sonnet
of unknown origin. 188 Of German collections the Maintz-
isch Gesangbuch (1661) has esca viatorum, 'O food of men
wayfaring' f32i=*3i4; and Simphonia Sirenum (1695)
provides Dignare me, Jesu, 'Jesu, grant me this, I pray'
*i82 t4 x 3j an d Finitajam sunt proelia, 'The strife is o'er'
*i35 f625- Quicunque certum quaeritis, 'All ye who seek for
sure relief *ii2='j'7i, is from an eighteenth-century
Office of the Sacred Heart; while the beautiful Sol
praeceps rapitur, 'The sun is sinking fast' *iy (**8 is a
translation in the original metre) , is apparently a product
of the early nineteenth century.

Finally, something must be said concerning two hymns
of which, on account of their wide use and popularity, we
should much like to know the history ; but that history
still remains very obscure, as regards both words and
music. The first is Veni, veni, Emmanuel, 'O come, O come,
Emmanuel' *49=f 8. This is obviously a versification of
five of the "Great O's", the Antiphons sung from very
early times before the Magnificat at Vespers on the days
preceding Christmas Eve. But the date of this versification
is uncertain. Neale, who translated it, ascribed it to the
twelfth century : but there seems to be no proof whatever
of this. It has been traced back as far as a collection of
1710 called Psalteriolum Cantionum Catholicarum. The origin
of the tune is no less mysterious. On its first appearance in
the Hymnal Noted (1854) it was described as "from a
French Missal in the National Library at Lisbon" : but

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

no trace of this has been found. It appears to be an
adaptation of a plainsong Jyra. 180

The other is the splendid Christmas hymn, Adeste
fideles, 'O come, all ye faithful' *sg jsS. 190 This would
seem to be a French produd of the late seventeenth or
early eighteenth century : but, rather oddly, the English
sources in which it first appears are earlier than the
French. It is given (with its tune), under the heading
'Another Prose on the Nativity of our LORD', in a book
published in London in 1782 called An Essay on the Church
Plain Chant, containing a collection of music sung in
Roman Catholic chapels in England. (We may note in
passing that in the same book appear for the first time
four tunes that have become exceedingly familiar
'Veni Sanfte Spiritus,' 'Melcombe' (originally a setting of
salutaris], 'Alleluia dulce carmen? and 'St. Thomas'
(both set to Tantum ergo) of which the first two are
certainly and the third possibly by Samuel Webbe (1740-
1816), organist of the Sardinian Chapel, who probably
edited the book.) Adeste fideles has also been found in a
collection of MS. music at Stonyhurst, dated 1751. In the
French version it is longer than in the English : and the
extra verses in E.H. 614 are from this source. The current
translation is based on one made by the Rev. F. Oakeley
in 1841 for Margaret Chapel, now All Saints, Margaret
Street. The tune has been ascribed to John Reading,
Organist of Winchester College, 1680; but without the
slightest evidence. Whatever its ultimate origin, the hymn
as we have it is one of the most priceless legacies of the
early Anglo-Catholic Revival to posterity.

CHAPTER V
GERMAN HYMNODY

WITH the coming of the Reformation an entirely
new chapter in the history of hymnody begins. To
the leaders of the movement in all countries no
principle was more fundamental than that which required
that public worship should be in the vernacular, "to the
end that the congregation may be thereby edified", as
Cranmer's preface to the 1549 Prayer Book puts it. And not
only must Divine service be intelligible to the people, but
they must be encouraged to participate actively in it them-
selves in "psalms and hymns and spiritual songs" in their
own tongue. In this department, indeed, even the medi-
aeval Church had been compelled to tolerate exceptions
to its use of Latin as the sole liturgical language. In the
"tropes" and cantiques of France, in the Leisen of Germany,
in the Laudi Spirituali of the Franciscan revival in Italy (of
which Discendi amor santo, 'Come down, O Love divine' *67o
J 1 52$ 1 77, by Bianco da Siena, d. 1434, is an example), and,
above all, in the "carols" of all countries, the common
people had been allowed to lift up their voices in the
language that they knew. But the use of such things was
kept within close limits, and was confined for the most
part to "extra-liturgical" occasions : to pilgrimages, to
mission preachings and to the popular services and cere-
monies connected with the great feasts of the Church. So
far as the Mass and the Divine Office were concerned, the
hymnal element was normally confined to the Latin
Sequences and Office Hymns, in which the people could
hardly be expecled to take a part.

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Now, however, in those countries where the Reforma-
tion triumphed, all was to be changed. It is true that the
latitude permitted as regards the kind of hymns used varied
considerably according to the particular form that the
Reformation assumed. In the Calvinist churches of France,
Switzerland, Scotland and of certain parts of Germany
the use of hymns was for a long time confined to metrical
translations of the Psalms and other passages of Scripture :
and the same was largely true of our own Church. In
Lutheran Germany, on the other hand, encouragement
was given from the outset to the production of entirely
new and original poetical compositions for use in public
worship. Luther himself was foremost in setting the
example. A great lover of music and steeped in the folk-
song and traditional vernacular hymnody of his race, he
saw clearly how much could be done to rouse enthusiasm
and to assist the dissemination of his views by means of
simple popular hymns set to well-known tunes, whether of
religious or secular origin. Here, then, once again, as in
the days of Arianism and Iconoclasm, the singing of
hymns was to be made a vehicle for spreading and per-
petuating a particular kind of theological teaching ; and
with such success that a contemporary Romanist com-
plained that "the whole country is singing itself into this
Lutheran doctrine". It must be remembered, too, that in
thus furbishing anew an ancient weapon of propaganda
the Reformers had at their disposal a mighty resource
unknown to their predecessors. The invention of printing
had made possible the cheap and indefinite multiplication
of hymn-books : and, in consequence, we see a continuous
stream of these pouring from the presses in all the countries
of the Reform.

From a purely musical point of view it would be hard
to deny to the hymns of Lutheran Germany pride of place

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GERMAN HYMNODY

over all others. The words of these hymns, however, are
normally on a much lower level than the music. The best
of them, indeed, are models of what hymns should be
whether as represented by the simple, forthright sturdi-
ness of Luther and his associates in the "heroic" phase
of the German Reformation or by the mingled fervour
and tenderness of Paul Gerhardt. But these are the
exception and not the rule even in the case of the
hymns of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ; while
those of the eighteenth century in their weak sentimen-
tality are often models, rather, of what hymns should
not be.

In any case the limits imposed by the scheme of the
present book preclude any very extended treatment of
these hymns. For, as Robert Bridges has said, " attempts
to introduce the German chorales into England have never,
so far as I know, been successful", "owing, I suppose", he
adds, "to a difference in the melodic sense of the two
nations". 191 And as without their tunes the words are for
the most part devoid of any great claim to attention,
especially through the distorting medium of a translation,
this has meant that the Lutheran influences which, owing
to the circumstances of the time in which it was compiled,
have left a definite mark on the Prayer Book are but
slightly represented in our hymnals. To the musical
public, of course, a large number of the German
"chorales" are becoming increasingly familiar in the mag-
nificently elaborated form in which Bach worked them
up in his two Passions and innumerable Church-cantatas.
But that public is limited : and so far as the services of the
Church are concerned Bridges's statement seems likely to
remain true no doubt for the reason that he suggests.
On the other hand, so notable a mass of hymnody cannot
be passed over without some attempt to give at least a
brief general view of it, not only for historical reasons, but
also because it has given us a certain number of hymns

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

which are hardly less popular in England than they are
in Germany. 192

The first beginnings of Church music in Germany are
associated with the name of the Emperor Charlemagne
(768-814). He was an enthusiastic admirer of the Roman
chant and founded schools for teaching it at Aachen,
Fulda and elsewhere in the German portion of his
dominions. If the testimony of John the Deacon, the
ninth-century biographer of Gregory the Great, is to be
trusted, the Roman cantors sent to instruct them found
their pupils decidedly raw material :

These mountainous bodies (he says) whose voices roar like
thunder, cannot imitate our sweet tones : for their barbarous
and ever-thirsty throats can only produce sounds like those of
a loaded waggon passing over a rough road. 193

Here possibly, however, speaks the voice of racial preju-
dice : the Italians have always been severe critics of
German vocal methods ! In any case, in the course of the
next hundred years the Swiss monastery of St. Gall, along
with a group of neighbouring houses, managed to accumu-
late wide fame as a musical centre. We have already seen
the part played by it in the development of the Latin
Sequences. Linked also with the same great monastery is
the name of the author of one of the two earliest specimens
of sacred poetry in the German language. Both of these
are Lives of Christ the one, called the Heliand, the work
of a Saxon priest (c. 830), the other written about forty
years later by Otfrid of Weissenburg, who had been a
monk both at Fulda and St. Gall. It is interesting to note
that Otfrid was largely responsible for the introduction
into German poetry of the rhymed stanza (imitated
from the Latin Office Hymns) in place of the earlier
German alliterative metre in which the Heliand was com-
posed. 194

Such large-scale efforts of German sacred poetry were

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GERMAN HYMNODY

for a long time without successors. During the next two
centuries the literature of Germany was almost exclusively
in Latin. On the other hand, it was at this period that the
first small beginnings of vernacular hymnody appeared.
In the worship of the Church the contribution of the
people was confined to the saying of Kyrie 'eleison, Christe
eleison, at intervals during the Latin service, sometimes
as many as two or three hundred times. Not long after the
development of the "Notkerian" Sequences, the clergy
had the idea of providing a kind of imitation of them in
the German language, so as to give the congregation
something less monotonous to sing. In these compositions,
written in irregular verse, each stanza ended with Kyrie
eleison, for which reason they came to be known as Leisen.
They were not sung, however, during the Mass, but
only at pilgrimages and on similar occasions. The first
verse of the earliest of them, written early in the tenth
century in honour of St. Peter, has been translated by
Miss Winkworth thus :

Our dear LORD of grace hath given
To St. Peter power in heaven,
That he may uphold alway
All- who hope in him and say

Kyrie eleison.

Christe eleison. 1 5

As time went on the number of these Leisen (or Leiche
as they were also called) increased largely. At the great
festivals they were even sung during the Mass itself. One
of the most celebrated is that for Easter, Christ ist erstanden,
of which Luther said that "after a time one tires of
singing all other hymns, but the Christ ist erstanden one
can always sing again". A number of different versions
of it exist, of which the earliest belong to the twelfth
century. It may be interesting to give here the first
verse of a translation by the English Reformer Bishop

H 103

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT
Coverdale in his Goostly Psalms and Spiritualle Songs (see

Christ is now risen agayne
From his death and all his payne ;
Therefore will we mery be
And rejoyse with hym gladlie.
Kirieleison.

It was on this hymn that Luther based his own Easter
hymn, Christ lag in Todesbanden, described in the book in
which it first appeared as "The hymn Christ ist erstanden
improved". Luther's version of words and melody was
used by Bach in one of the most resplendent of his Church
Cantatas, 'Christ lay in death's dark prison'. An adapted
arrangement of the earlier form of the tune is appro-
priately set to 'Jesus lives ! ' in t x 34 + 1 55-

Concurrently with the production of original hymns of
this kind a number of the more famous Latin hymns and
Sequences were translated into the vernacular a prac-
tice that appears to have been more or less confined to the
German-speaking lands. These, too, were sung in church,
though it would seem that generally speaking their use
was discouraged except on extra-liturgical occasions.

In the closing centuries of the Middle Ages the German
Sequences sung at Easter and Whitsuntide were expanded
into longer hymns. The same centuries also produced a
great output of carols for various occasions, in Germany
as in other countries. These lie outside the scope of this
book: but two may be mentioned in passing, both on
account of their intrinsic beauty and because they have
become familiar in England in Dr. G. R. Woodward's
beautiful arrangements, viz. Es kommt ein Schiff geladen,
'There comes a galley laden,' by the famous fourteenth-
century preacher and mystic, Johann Tauler ; and the
lovely Es ist ein Ros entsprungen, 'The noble stem of Jesse'
(Cowley Carol Book, series i, 31, 19). Many of these carols
exhibit a quaint mixture of Latin and German lines, as in

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GERMAN HYMNODY

the well-known In dulcijubilo (ibid. 12). In our hymnals the
popular tune 'Quern pastores laudavere' *622 f 543 +540,
is such a carol-melody, and another, 'Ave Virgo virginum'
*6?9 1 131 * i44> is a late mediaeval German tune of similar
origin. A third, 'Ave Hierarchia 3 , was shortened and
adapted by W. H. Monk into the familiar tune to 'LORD,
Thy word abideth'.

Now, too, arose a custom later followed by Luther of
setting sacred words to popular secular songs of the time.
The familiar tune known as "Innsbruck" is an example.
It was originally a song voicing the homesickness of a
German artisan, Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen, 'Innsbruck,
I now must leave thee.' This suggested the idea and pro-
vided the tune of a hymn in contemplation of eternity,
Welt, ich muss dich lassen, 'O world, I now must leave
thee' the hymn which inspired the lovely chorale-prelude
written by Brahms on his death-bed. The same melody was
later used for a number of other hymns, including Paul
Gerhardt's Nun ruhen die Wdlder, so exquisitely rendered by
Robert Bridges as 'The duteous day now closes' f2y8
57 ; though it should be noted that only the first two
verses are a translation, and a free one at that, the last two
being Bridges's own. 196 (The version of the tune in A.M.
86, 276 is debased and spoilt.)

The name of Heinrich von Laufenburg, the chief and
the most prolific of the German sacred poets of the
fifteenth century, is prominently identified with this
transformation of secular songs into religious hymns, and
also with the translation of the great Latin hymns into
German. He was a secular priest in Switzerland and later
at Freiburg in Baden : but in 1445 he became a monk in
the convent of the Knights of St. John at Strassburg. He
was still living in 1458, but probably died soon after. His
lovely little cradle-song of the Blessed Virgin, Ach lieber
Herre, Jesus Christ, was translated by Miss Winkworth,
'Ah, Jesu Christ, my Lord most dear,' and appears in

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

E.H. t338 as a hymn for Holy Baptism. It is set there to
the original melody accompanying the words in Laufen-
burg's MS. and presumably of his own composition.

ii

Even before the appearance of Luther on the scene the
use of an exclusively vernacular liturgy and hymnody had
found a foothold (however slender) in central Europe.
The great German Reformation movement of the six-
teenth century had its precursor in the fifteenth in the
movement associated with the name of the Bohemian
John Hus, who was condemned as a heretic by the Council
of Constance and publicly burned in 141 5. The determina-
tion of the majority of the Bohemian people to defend
Hus's orthodoxy and their own led to civil war, in which
the Roman party sought to crush the opposition with
foreign aid. But soon a division appeared in the ranks of
the followers of Hus. The more moderate party were con-
tent to demand certain disciplinary changes, including
the restoration of the Cup at Mass to the laity. But the
more extreme seftion, the "Taborites", wanted a com-
plete recasting of the traditional Church system on demo-
cratic lines, with public worship in their own Bohemian
tongue. Eventually Rome and the moderates came to
terms : and the Taborites were crushed and ceased to
exist as a political force. But they maintained an obscure
and hunted existence as a religious fellowship, and in 1467
united with other rebels against Catholic orthodoxy to
form a separate and organized church called the Unitas
Fralrum or Bohemian Brethren. In their worship hymns
played an important part. These hymns, old and new,
were brought together in a number of successive collec-
tions culminating in the book of 1561, containing 744
hymns. 197

A series of parallel collections in German began with
the book called Em Men Gesangbuchlein, published in 1531

1 06

GERMAN HYMNODY

by Michael Weisse (c. I48o-i534). 198 Many of the hymns
in these collections were subsequently embodied in the
Lutheran books. Weisse was an ex-monk who, coming
under the influence of Luther's writings, had joined the
Bohemian Brethren and became the founder and leader
of their German communities. Some of his hymns were
translations from the Bohemian and Latin : others were of
his own composition. Among the latter is Christ ist
erstanden, familiar in Miss Winkworth's translation, 'Christ
the LORD is risen again' *i36 fi29 +153. A later collec-.
tion of 1566 contained Petrus Herbert's Sapphic hymn,
Die Nacht ist kommen, 'Now GOD be with us, for the night
is closing' 148. Besides these hymns a number of melodies
have been taken over from the German books of the
Bohemian Brethren ; four being found in E.H., viz. J54,
121, 202, and the fine swinging melody of 604.

The hymns in Weisse's collection were well known to
his great contemporary Martin Luther (1483-1546) and
were much admired by him. By the time it appeared
Luther had followed the example of the Bohemian
Brethren in providing a vernacular public worship. A
complete German liturgy was issued in 1526. In connec-
tion with this new psalms and hymns were needed to take
the place of the old Latin hymns and Sequences. Luther
had already set to work to provide them. The German
hymns of the later Middle Ages were so steeped in what
he believed to be false dodrine, and especially in an
almost idolatrous veneration of the Blessed Virgin, as to
be useless for his purpose. It was therefore a case of making
new ones. Here Luther himself took the lead, at the same
time inviting his friends and disciples to associate them-
selves with him in the task. To his friend Spalatin he
wrote, at the close of 1523 :

It is my plan ... to make vernacular psalms for the people.
. . . We seek therefore everywhere for poets. And as you have
such skill and practice in the German tongue, I entreat you to

107

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

work with us in this matter and to turn one of the psalms into
a hymn after the pattern of an effort of my own that I have
sent you. But I desire that new-fangled and courtly expressions
may be avoided and that the words may all be exceedingly
simple and common, such as plain folk may understand, yet
withal pure and skilfully handled 199

an excellent summary, by the way, of the desiderata of a
good hymn.

Besides a number of such German versions of the
psalms, etc. (including the Te Deum and the Lord's
Prayer), and of translations from the Latin (e.g. of the
Veni Creator], Luther remodelled certain of the earlier
German hymns. But his most important contributions
were entirely his own. Four of his hymns appeared in the
first Lutheran hymn-book called Achtliederbuch and 18 in
the Erfurt Enchiridion, both of which books were issued in
1524. Altogether 37 hymns may be with some confidence
ascribed to him. Of these the most famous, and the only
one that has come into fairly general use in English guise,
is the great Einfeste Burg, ZQ() 'A safe stronghold our GOD
is still' 1362 J436=*678. It is inspired by the 46th Psalm,
but is not a translation of it. The common account, popu-
larized by Heine, is that it was written by Luther when on
his way to the Diet of Worms in 1 52 1 , at the time when
he uttered his famous words (echoed in v. 3) : "If there
were as many devils on the roofs as there are tiles in the
roofs of Worms, I would go and would not be afraid."
But it is now agreed that it was actually written at the
time of the Diet of Speyer in 1529, when the German
Princes made their great Protest and the name "Protes-
tant" was born. A number of translations of it into
English exist. Of these E.H. and S.P. use the magnifi-
cently rugged version by Thomas Carlyle, and A.M. one
by Miss Elizabeth Wordsworth.

The tune of this grand hymn is not less glorious than the
words, which it fits to perfection. There seems to be little

1 08

GERMAN HYMNODY

doubt that it, too, is from Luther's pen. For the great
Reformer was musician as well as poet. He did not merely
see, like many religious leaders before and since, the value
of music for propaganda purposes ; he loved it for its own
sake. He was wont to say : "He who despises music, as all
fanatics do, will never be my friend." In his house after
dinner he would take his lute and sing and play in the
company of his intimates. He was no dour fanatic like
Calvin and Knox, but a man whose intense humanity was
at once his strength and his weakness. Thus it was only
natural that he should pay special attention to the organi-
zation of church-song : for he said, "I would fain see all
arts, specially music, in the service of Him Who made and
created them." A large number of the old melodies set to
Latin and German hymns were furbished afresh by him
and his musical associates : and he wrote new tunes as
well. Of these the Einfeste Burg tune is the only one that
seems to be certainly his : though others have been attri-
buted to him, including the tune associated with his own
Christmas hymn (written for his children), Vom Himmel
hoch ; though on the hymn's first appearance in 1535 it was
set to an old carol melody. (The tune is in *57, \ 17, J8o i.)
The Advent hymn, 'Great GOD, what do I see and hear ? ',
is often called "Luther's hymn" : but there is no evidence
that the tune was written by him, and it is certain that he
had nothing whatever to do with the words (see below,
p. 112).

Of the hymn-writers contemporary with Luther who
contributed to the earliest Lutheran books, M. Weisse has
been already spoken of. The following are also worthy of
mention here: Justus Jonas, Paul Eber, Paul . Speratus,
Nicolas Decius, Nicolaus Hermann, and the shoemaker-
poet of Nuremberg, Hans Sachs, the real hero of Wagner's
Die Meistersinger. Of their hymns, as of those of Luther
himself, it may be said that they are admirable examples
of what really good popular hymns should be. being

109

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

"neither didactic nor introspective, but natural, cordial
and fearless, at once popular and churchly". 201 They
express, as we have said, the spirit of the heroic period of
the German Reformation on its best side : and there is
nothing surprising in their continued popularity in their
own country through centuries of use. They do not seem,
however, to have borne transplantation to English soil.
Each of these writers has had his translators : but no hymn
of theirs has come into common use. On the other hand,
a number of the melodies to which the hymns of this
period were set figure in our hymnals, though it can
hardly be said, despite their excellence, that any of them
has won wide popularity. Besides those already men-
tioned, examples are the tunes to Luther's Nunfreut euch
*2Q3 i, and his paraphrase of the Lord's Prayer Vater unser
*644 1462 +566, to Speratus's Es is das Heil *2Q3 ii t47&
156, and to Weisse's Freuen wir uns fSH tSJO. Of special
interest is the tune used for Neale's translation of the Latin
hymn (of uncertain origin), Attolle paulum lumina, 'O
sinner, lift the eye of faith' *io4 t I0 3- It originally be-
longed to Decius's metrical German version of the Gloria
in excelsis, Allein Gott in der HoK sei Ehr, and is a trans-
formation of the opening phrases of a mediaeval plain-
song melody of the Gloria which had been already adapted
to the prose German version of it in the Lutheran Mass-
book of I524- 202 This may serve as an example of the
reshaping of old material effected by Luther and his
musical colleagues. The chief of these was Johann Walther,
whom Luther summoned from Jorgau in 1524 to live
with him for a time and help in the arrangement of
church-song. Walther was responsible for the arrangement
from melodies of an earlier date of the noble tune to
Luther's version of St. Ambrose's Veni Redemptor gentium^
Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland *8g fno +295, and of the
beautiful wistful one set to his own Herzlick thut mich
erfreuen 1284 249 i.

no

GERMAN HYMNODY

The second period of German hymnody may be said to
date from about 1570 to the close of the Thirty Years'
War in 1648. It was something of a period of transition.
The hymns produced retain for the most part the "objec-
tive, churchly" character of the period preceding, though
their general level is by no means so high. But as time
went on, and especially when Germany plunged headlong
into the protracted agony of the terrible religious war that
reduced much. of her almost to a desert, the subjective and
plaintive note began to creep in that was to be so marked
a characteristic of the later Lutheran hymnody. Among
the hymn-writers of the period the greatest name is that
of Philipp Nicolai (1556-1608), author of the words, and
probably of the tune as well, of Wie schon leuchtet das
Morgenstern, 'How brightly beams the morning star' -'I go,
and of the superb Wachet auf, 'Wake, O wake' |i2=J687 ;
the latter written during a fearful visitation of the plague
in the Westphalian town in which he was pastor. But the
most celebrated hymn of the period is the splendid thanks-
giving, Nun danket die Gott, 'Now thank we all our GOD'
*379 t533 t35j which has been called "the German Te
Deum", and is almost the only Lutheran chorale that has
really achieved the rank of a popular favourite in English-
speaking countries. It has often been asserted that its
author, Martin Rinkart (1586-1648), wrote it as a thanks-
giving for the conclusion of the Peace of Westphalia that
ended the Thirty Years' War. But it is probable that it
appeared in the first edition of Rinkart' s Jesu Herz-
Bilchlein in 1636, so that this can hardly be true. 203
Rinkart was a man of frail physique but heroic character,
who distinguished himself by his selfless devotion to his
flock at Eilenberg in Saxony during the war. He had only
just finished burying over 4000 of them who had died of
plague, when the town was faced with a demand from the
Swedish forces for 30,000 thalers a sum which through
his intercession was reduced to 2000 florins. Two other

in

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

hymn-writers may also be mentioned. First, Johann Heer-
mann (1585-1647), author of the fine Sapphic Passion
hymn, Herzliebster Jesu, translated by Robert Bridges as
'Ah, holy Jesu, how hast Thou offended' fyo 99. The
tune of this was certainly, and the tune of Nun danket
almost certainly, written by Johann Criiger, of whom
more will be said in the next section. The other is Matthaus
Apelles von Lowenstern (1594-1648), who wrote the
hymn (also in Sapphics) Christe du Beistand, on which
Philip Pusey, Dr. Pusey's brother, based his well-known
'Lord of our life and GOD of our salvation' *2i4 f435
+349, written in 1834 t portray the state of the English
Church at the time, "assailed from without, enfeebled and
distracted within, but on the eve of a great awakening". 204
Lowenstern was also an accomplished musician, and him-
self wrote the melody of his hymn (used for Pusey's in
S.P.}, along with two others which appear with it in
S.P. $236, 670.

Another earlier hymn-writer of the same period,
Bartholomaus Ringwaldt (1532-97), has been credited
with supplying the German original of "Luther's hymn"
so-called, 'Great GOD, what do I see and hear ? ' *52 J4-
The attribution, however, is without foundation. 205 It is
true that there is a hymn of Ringwaldt' s written in the
same metre and dealing with the same subject of the
Second Advent : but there the resemblance ends. The
first stanza of the English hymn appeared anonymously
in a hymn-book published at Sheffield in 1802, the second
being added by Dr. W. B. Collyer in his Hymns of 1812,
along with two others. In place of these last two, the exist-
ing verses 3-4 were supplied by T. Gotterill in the
gth edition of his Seledion in 1820 (see below p. 194).
Fine hymn though it be of its kind, it can hardly be
denied that its extremely literal application of Scriptural
eschatology is uncongenial to modern ears : and it is
much to be wished that the solemn old tune might become

112

GERMAN HYMNODY

permanently wedded to new and adequate words that
would retain for it its Advent associations. 206

in

The leading figure in the later classical Lutheran
hymnody, as Luther is in the earlier, is Paulus Gerhardt
(1607-76). It has been said of him by Miss Winkworth
that in his hymns "the religious song of Germany finds its
purest and sweetest expression" and that "he may be said
to be the typical poet of the Lutheran Church as Herbert
is of the English". 207 He is by far the most eminent repre-
sentative of the third period of German hymnody
dating from 1648 to the outbreak of the Pietistic con-
troversy in 1690. In the writers of this period the subjective
and mystical element that had already begun to appear
becomes more and more marked, and the "churchly,
confessional" element sinks into the background. But
fervour and tenderness have not yet degenerated into
sentimentality.

Nearly two-thirds of Gerhardt's life were passed in the
dark days of the Thirty Years' War, and at the age of
forty-four he was still only a private tutor and candidate
for orders. But in 1651 he received a post as pastor near
Berlin, whence in 1657 he was called to the great Church
of St. Nicholas in that city. Here he became a favourite
preacher and won universal love and esteem. Unfortu-
nately he became involved in the dispute between the
Eleftor Frederick William I and the Lutheran clergy of
Berlin, and in 1666 was deprived of his office. Two years
later he was appointed Archidiaconus of Lubben in
Saxony, where he died. He wrote 120 hymns in all, which
appeared at different times from 1649 onwards. The most
famous. is the grand Passion hymn, Haupt voll Blut und
Wunden, 'O sacred Head, sore wounded' JIOQ Jis8=
*iii. This was based on a mediaeval Latin hymn be-
ginning Salve caput cruentatum, one of the earliest of the

"3

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

many poems inspired by the great carved and painted
roods that began to tower in the churches of Western
Europe during the thirteenth century. The Latin hymn
was formerly attributed to St. Bernard : but it belongs
rather to the thirteenth century and may possibly be by
Arnulf von Loewen ( 1 200-5 1). 208 Extraordinary to
relate, the tragic "Passion-Chorale" indissolubly wedded
to Gerhardt's hymn, in England as in Germany, was
originally a love-song composed by the eminent musician
H. L. Hassler (1564-1612) 209 a further proof that
tunes are adaptable things !

Another hymn of Gerhardt's has been already men-
tioned, the beautiful Nun ruhen die W alder (see p. 105). A
third, Befiehl du deine Weg\ which well expresses the spirit
of simple trust in GOD that supported Gerhardt through
his troubled life, was freely translated by John Wesley.
Of this translation two centos are in use : one in A.M.,
Tut thou thy trust in GOD' *6gs (set to a fine manly tune
by Wesley's nephew, Samuel), and another in S.P.,
'Commit thou all thy griefs' 479. S.P. adds two other
hymns by Gerhardt : Aufden Nebelfolgt die Sonn', 'Cometh
sunshine after rain' +478, and a 'modern' version of
Frohlich soil, 'Hearts at Christmas-time' 89. The latter
appears in some collections in Miss Winkworth's trans-
lation, 'All my heart this night rejoices.'

Contemporary with Gerhardt and closely related to
him is Johann Franck (1618-77). He was Burgomaster at
Guben in Brandenburg and enjoyed in his day a high
reputation as a poet, both secular and religious. His
favourite theme is the mystical union of the soul with
Christ. This is exemplified in the two best known of his
hymns : Jesu meine Freude, 'Jesu, priceless treasure' 544,
and the> Communion hymn, Schmiicke dich, 'Deck thyself,
my soul' f36 +267. We may mention, too, Tobias
Clausnitzer (1619-84), author of another Communion
hymn, Liebster Jesu, 'Dearest Jesu, we are here' *7is, with

114

GERMAN HYMNODY

its beautiful tune by J. R. Able (1625-73), w h also wrote
the even more beautiful one set to George Herbert's
'King of glory 5 at *665-

In connection with Gerhardt and Franck it is fitting to
mention the man who wrote the tunes for a number of
their hymns, Johann Criiger (1598-1662). Criiger was a
distinguished organist and composer who became Cantor
of the cathedral at Berlin. In 1644 he published the first
issue of his Praxis pietatis melica, a collection of tunes which
ran into innumerable editions. To have written the melo-
dies of Nun danket and Herzliebster Jesu would be title
enough for fame : but Criiger wrote many other fine tunes
as well, including those to Franck's Schmucke dich and
Jesu, meine Freude (the latter treated with such ornate
magnificence by Bach) and the melodies on which are
founded the well-known tunes to 'Hail to the Lord's
Anointed' *2ig f45 87 and 'Christ, Whose glory fills the
skies' *7 the last better represented in J282 $24.

The same period, 1648-90, also witnessed the emer-
gence, in Johann Neander (1650-80), of the first prominent
name in the hymnody of the Church which divided with
the Lutheran the allegiance of Protestant Germany, the
so-called 'Reformed' Church. For a long time this Church,
like the other more extreme Protestant bodies in Europe,
frowned upon the use of anything save metrical versions
of the Psalms in public worship. As time went on, however,
the prejudice died down. Neander (the name is a
Graecized form of Neumann) was, like Luther, both poet
and musician. In his student days he came under the
influence of Pietism: and after his appointment in 1674
as Rector of the Latin School at Diisseldorf his uncon-
ventional zeal brought him into conflict with the authori-
ties of the Reformed Church there. He found comfort for
the rest of his short life in writing hymns. These were pub-
lished in 1 680 in a volume called A and Q, and many of
them quickly found their way into the Lutheran books.

"5

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

His finest and best-known hymn is the splendid Lobe den
Herrn, 'Praise to the Lord, the Almighty, the King of
creation' *657 1536 626. The tune of this is an adapta-
tion, probably by Neander himself, of an earlier chorale.
Another hymn is Meine Hoffnung stehetfest, 'All my hope
in GOD is founded' 442, the tune of which is also an
adaptation (it appears in slightly altered form in * 102 ii).
But Neander's best-known tune is an original composition
and is indissolubly joined in England to Neale's 'Come,
ye faithful, raise the anthem' *302 fsSo +477.

One interesting but rather isolated figure of the period
remains to be mentioned, Johann Scheffler (1624-77).
Brought up a Lutheran, he fell under the influence of
Bohme and the mystics and finally found his way into the
Church of Rome in 1653, taking the name of "Angelus
Silesius". His hymns enjoy a high reputation ; and he
figures in our hymn-books as the author ofLiebe die du mich
zum Bilde, 'O Love, Who formedstme to wear' *i2 1460
J6o8. The tune to which it is set in A.M. is a debased form
of a very fine one by another hymn-writer of the period,
Georg Neumark (1621-81), who wrote it for his own hymn,
Wer nur den lieben Gott Idsst walten. The original version is
given in t45^ +606. It appears in Mendelssohn's St. Paul
set to the words 'To Thee, O Lord, I yield my spirit.'

The close of the seventeenth century was a bad time for
Germany. The country had not yet recovered from the
ravages of the Thirty Years' War : agriculture, trade and
industry alike languished. Even religion had largely lost
its power to help : for official Lutheranism had" become
arid and fossilized, concerned mainly with barren con-
troversies. But already a movement had begun which was
to inaugurate a kind of second Reformation. It was called
"Pietism", and its founder was a Lutheran pastor, Philip
Jacob Spener (1635-1705). In many ways Pietism re-
sembled our own Methodism, being puritan in morality
and at once emotional and practical in its religious out-

116

GERMAN HYMNODY

look. At first it had to endure persecution : but eventually
it won for itself a recognized place within the Lutheran
fold. To this school of thought belonged nearly all the
hymn-writers of the fourth period of German hymnody,
which may be roughly dated 1690-1757. Spener himself
wrote hymns : and an intimate friend of his, Johann Jakob
Schiitz (1640-90), was the author of Sei Lob 1 und Ehr,
'Sing praise to GOD' *293- But the chief singer of Lutheran
Pietism was Johann Anastastius Freylinghausen (1670-
1739). He wrote 44 hymns: but his importance for
English hymnody lies in the sphere of music, not of words.
His Geistreiches Gesangbuch (1704) is described by Dr. Frere
as "the only book which can as a collection be set alongside
with the Praxis Pietatis Melica". 210 Five tunes from it
appear in S.P., viz. 27 (a lovely tune here set to a trans-
lation of its own hymn, Morgenglanz in Ewigkeit, by Chris-
tian Knorr Baron von Rosenroth) 77, 139, 292, 645. The
tune to 'On this day, the first of days' *34 is an adaptation
of the last of these tunes. Another Pietist hymn- writer was
Adam Drese (1620-1701) : but he, too, figures in English
hymnals only as musician as composer of the tune to
his own hymn, Seelenbrautigam, set in A.M. to Zinzendorf's
'Jesus, still lead on' *66g, and in E.H. and S.P. to W.
Romanis's 'Round me falls the night' f 272 52. The great
J. S. Bach (1685-1750) flourished at this period : but he
was rather a harmonizer in his own matchless fashion of
other men's chorales than a composer of new ones, though
the lovely tune Nicht so traurig *3i8 ii fioo 264 is his. In
addition S.P. has utilized a number of the melodies that he
wrote or arranged for the Schemelli Gesangbuch and the
Anna Magdalena Notenbuch. 211

Besides J. J. Schutz only two hymn-writers of this period
are represented in our hymnals. One is Heinrich Schenk
(1656-1727), who wrote only a single hymn, but that one
which in England is, perhaps, the German hymn next in
popularity to Nun danket, viz. Wer sinddie vor Gottes Throne,

117

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

'Who are these like stars appearing?' *427 f204 210.
The other is Benjamin Schmolck (1672-1737), a Silesian
pastor who was the most popular and prolific hymn-
writer of his time. His hymn for Baptism, Liebster Jesu (not
to be confused with Glausnitzer's), 'Blessed Jesu, here we
stand', is at f3S6.

The bulk of the Pietists, as we have said, remained
within the Lutheran Church to leaven it. But a sedion
of them broke off into the separatist body called the
Moravians. We have already spoken of the Unitas Fratrum
or Bohemian Brethren. Driven from Bohemia by persecu-
tion in 1547, they found a refuge in Moravia, only to be
suppressed there too after the Catholic triumph at the
Battle of the White Mountain in 1620. A remnant, how-
ever, lived on in secret, who called themselves the "hidden
seed". Early in the eighteenth century Nicolaus, Count
Zinzendorf (1700-60), a Saxon nobleman who had been
brought up under Pietist influence (he was Spener's god-
son), gave them a refuge on his ancestral estate, where
they formed a colony called Herrnhut. Under Zinzen-
dorf's auspices the old Moravian Church was virtually
refounded in 1727, and spread to different parts of
Germany and much more widely still. More will be said
concerning Zinzendorf and the Moravians when we come
to speak of their influence on the Methodism of John
Wesley and its hymnody. All that concerns us now is that
Zinzendorf himself was a hymn-writer and editor of
hymn-books. His hymns number over 2000 and are of
very varying merit. Two are represented in A.M. : Jesu
geh' voran, 'Jesus, still lead on' *66g and Deiner Kinder
Sammelplatz, 'Christ will gather in His own' *4oo.

Of far greater importance, however, than Zinzendorf
is another figure who held aloof from the organized
Lutheranism of his time, but in this case without founding a
seel of his own. Gerard Tersteegen (1697-1769) was a pure
mystic, influenced by the teachings of Jacob Bohme even

118

GERMAN HYMNODY

more than by Pietism. Like many others of his kind, he
was in no way a schismatic : it was merely that institu-
tional religion did not interest him much. Brought up in
the Reformed Church, he left a well-to-do home in early
life to live in a little cottage near Muhlheim, where he
practised ribbon-weaving and devoted his leisure to
prayer, writing and addressing private religious gather-
ings. As the claims upon him increased, he devoted him-
self exclusively to this informal ministry and was much
sought after from all quarters, both personally and by
correspondence. As hymn-writer Tersteegen, alike in his
mystical cast of mind and his poetic manner, more nearly
resembles Johann Scheffler than anyone else. He deeply
influenced John Wesley, who translated two of his finest
hymns : Gott ist gegenwartig, 'Lo ! GOD is here 3 *526 t^37
1 191, and Verborgen Gottesliebe, 'Thou hidden love of GOD'
*6oo +671.

By the middle of the eighteenth century the impulse of
Pietism was in turn becoming exhausted. Like all similar
movements it was weak on the intellectual side : and its
emotionalism degenerated easily into sentimentality and
the dreary cliches that are the despair of translators of
those terrible libretti from which Bach's incredible genius
contrived somehow to wring the inspiration of his Church-
cantatas. In the sphere of religion, as elsewhere, the law of
action and reaction largely holds sway : it was, too, the
age of the "Enlightenment" in Europe. It was only natural,
then, that the religious life of Germany should be pene-
trated by the ideas that were in the air : and that, there as
in other countries, the particular brand of religion should
prevail which we associate with the eighteenth century
cold, rational, theistic rather than Christian. The
hymnody of the period (1750-1830) necessarily reflects
the change. The old hymns were watered down to suit the
new spirit : the new ones were lyrics and odes rather than
hymns in the old sense. The chief representative of this

i 119

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

school was Christian Fiirchtegott Gellert (1715-69), a pro-
fessor at Leipzig. He enjoyed a great reputation in his
day, but is less admired now. We must not forget, how-
ever, that it is to him we owe the original of one of the
best and best-loved of our hymns, Jesus lebt, 'Jesus lives !'
*-i40=']'i34 155. Another very popular hymn dates
from the same period, 'We plough the fields and scatter'
*3^3 T 2 93 ? I 4 < ft i s a translation of three verses of a
hymn by Matthias Claudius (1740-1815). The "German
Milton", Klopstock, author of Messiah, was a hymn-
writer of this school : but none of his hymns is used in
England.

Among the tunes of German origin belonging to this
period four are particularly popular. One is 'Austria', set
to 'Glorious things of thee are spoken' *545 J393 +5-
This was the work of the great Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-
1809), and was originally written as a setting of a national
hymn sung on the Emperor's birthday in 1797, being
afterwards used by the composer as the theme of the
splendid variations that form part of his "Emperor"
quartet. 212 The second is the lusty tune to 'We plough the
fields' *383 ^293 14, written by J. A. P. Schulz and set
to Claudius's hymn in a collection of 1800 : and the two
last those to 'O happy band of pilgrims' *224 and 'Blest
Creator of the light' *38 both by J. H. Knecht (1752-
1817). A tune by Haydn's younger brother Michael
appears at *666. In the tunes of this period, as we might
expeft, the starkness of the old chorales gives way to a
lighter style, more flowing in melody, more luscious in
harmony a style which undoubtedly was one of the
major factors that went to the making of the characteristic
"Victorian" hymn-tune. Two later German examples of
this style are the two chorales by F. Filitz (1804-76), from
which are adapted the popular tunes 'Capetown' *i63
J50i 1507 and 'Mannheim' *ig6 1426 555 ii. Apart
from this musical influence, the debt of our hymnals to

120

GERMAN HYMNODY

nineteenth-century German hymnody is negligible.
Lutheranism went on producing its sacred poets as before :
but none of their work has found a permanent welcome
within our shores.

IV

Before closing this chapter something must be said con-
cerning our debt to the Catholic hymnody of Germany
a debt (in respecl of tunes rather than words) that has
been considerably increased of late years. It is a curious
fad that while Lutheran musicians were busy remoulding
not a few of the old religious melodies of pre-Reformation
Germany into chorales, the German Catholics appear to
have been at small pains to guard their inheritance in its
original form. Indeed, the earliest printed source of
mediaeval German song is not of Catholic but of Swedish-
Lutheran origin. In 1582 Theodoricus Petri published PiUe
Cantiones, a collection of such melodies, sacred and secular,
most of them probably Swedish but a minority German. 2 1 3
This book has been a gold mine to editors of carol-collec-
tions, particularly to Neale and to Dr. G. R. Woodward.
Some of its contents appear, too, in our hymn-books. The
thirteenth-century melody ordinarily used for the Christ-
mas hymn, 'Of the Father's love begotten', probably
reached the Hymnal Noted (in which it first appeared) from
this source ; though it has been found in MSS. of earlier
date. It was originally set to a Trope on the San&us be-
ginning Divinum mysterium. 214 The correct form is the
"alternative version" in A.M. 56, which also appears at
f6i3 $387. The second tune to *4g8, 'The foe behind',
is also from Piae Cantiones, where it is set to a hymn on the
Passion : Neale's words were written to "carry" it. S.P.
has four more tunes from the same source, viz. $4, 272,
385, 502. Of these the first is our old friend, 'Good King
Wenceslas' (a charming figment of Neale's imagination,
by the way) ; the melody being set in S.P. to a translation
of the springtide carol to which it belongs in Piae Cantiones.

121

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

The explanation of Catholic indifference to such things
is doubtless that the Counter-Reformation, unlike the
Reformation, was not encouraging to popular hymnody.
But, as time went on, it was discovered that vernacular
hymns could not be dispensed with : and from the closing
decades of the sixteenth century onwards a series of collec-
tions of hymns, German as well as Latin, made their
appearance. The earliest of these were the three collec-
tions by Leisentritt, the last of which (1584) contained the
melody Ave Virgo Virginum already mentioned, along with
another on which the well-known tune 'Narenza' *a68
J5i8 is founded. In the Andernach Geistliche Gesdnge
(1608) the plainsong tunes of the Latin hymns were
largely supplanted by melodies of the chorale type. S.P.
has three tunes from this source, J 1 30 ii, 305, 478, and A.M.
one, *754 i. The Cologne Gesangbuch of 1623 contained the
splendid Easter melody Lasst uns etfreuen, which has be-
come so well known in connexion with Mr. Riley's fine
hymn, 'Ye watchers and ye holy ones' JS^- In A.M. it is
appropriately set (in a more exacl: version) to 'Light's
glittering morn' *I26 ; while the compilers of S.P. have
rather rashly dared to mate its magnificence with a new
Easter hymn, 'Let us rejoice' $157. S.P. has three other
tunes from the 1619 and 1623 editions of this book, 163,
167, 549 ii. Lastly we may mention the collection called
Heilige Seelenlust, first published in 1657. The author of it
was Johann Scheffler, who has been dealt with above in
connection with Lutheran hymnody because most of his
hymns were written before his conversion to Rome. The
musical editor of his book was Georg Joseph, who wrote
or adapted the tune that forms the basis of the popular
one to 'At even, ere the sun was set 5 *ao fa66, 42 ii.
Other tunes from the same source are that of the New
Year's hymn 'For thy mercy 5 *73 J286 and the pretty
lilting melody at 559.

122

CHAPTER VI
THE METRICAL PSALTERS

FROM the moment of its inception the Reformation
movement of the sixteenth century showed the signs
of division into two camps a Right and a Left, to
borrow the phraseology of continental politics. The Right
is represented by Lutheranism and (in a still more marked
degree) by our own Church of England ; the Left by the
various bodies that are grouped together as 'Reformed' or
'Calvinistic'. Calvin himself at this period had not yet
appeared upon the scene. But even while Luther was
initiating his own movement in Germany, a parallel revolt
against Rome was being undertaken by Zwingli in
Switzerland, but on more drastic lines. In Zwingli the
mystical and emotional elements that were so marked a
feature of Luther's make-up were lacking. He was essenti-
ally a humanist and an intellecTualist ; a man, too, devoid
of any sentimental feeling for the past and always ready to
push his principles to their logical issue. This mentality
was reflected in his attitude towards public worship in
general and the Mass in particular. The outward observ-
ances of religion were to be reduced to a minimum and
nothing tolerated that was not authorized by the plain
letter of Holy Scripture : the Sacrament was to be regarded
as a "bare memorial" of Christ's Death. Zwingli himself
perished in battle in 1531 : but his trenchant spirit was
inherited and his work carried on by the Frenchman Jean
Calvin, who proceeded to ere6t on the foundation laid by
him a rigid and highly organized system of doclrine and
discipline, which from its focus at Geneva was to spread

123

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

over large parts of Western Europe and into the New
World as well. In Germany it was never to win more than
a minority-support (and even then only in a modified
form) as against its rival Lutheranism. But in Protestant
Switzerland, in Holland and in Scotland it was to be
triumphant; in France it was for a long time to con-
stitute a formidable menace to Catholicism; while in
England it not only left its mark on the formularies of the
national Church at the close of the sixteenth century, but
also inspired the great Puritan revolt against the Eliza-
bethan religious settlement.

The difference between Lutheranism and Calvinism is
to be seen in their respective attitudes towards hymnody
as well as in major matters. The former, while encouraging
the use of German metrical translations of the Psalms, was
willing at the same time to give free play to the poetic
gifts of its members in the production of original hymns,
and even to permit the adaptation of Catholic material for
a similar purpose. Zwingli and Calvin, on the other hand,
with their rigid insistence on "The Bible and nothing
but the Bible", frowned on anything save the metrical
psalms. Thus the hymn-singing of the "Reformed"
Churches was for a long time virtually confined to these.
The metrical psalters of these various Churches were
naturally closely interconnected, despite their differences
of language ; so that in dealing with them we shall have to
consider them as a single whole. It should be added that,
while in doctrine, organization and ritual the Church of
England was more Catholic than the Lutheran, in the
sphere of hymnody it followed for a long time the Calvin-
istic churches in its preference for metrical psalms over
hymns. Thus the French-Swiss (Genevan), the German,
the English and the Scottish Psalters in their mutual
inter-relations form the subject of the present chapter.

124

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

The beginnings of Protestant metrical psalmody arose
in the rather surprising milieu of the frivolous and corrupt
French Court of the Valois. 215 The sister of Francis I,
Marguerite, married to the dispossessed King of Navarre,
was a friend to Humanism and to the reforming doctrine
that was so closely connected with it. Herself a contributor
(at least) to the celebrated Heptameron that bears her
name, she was the patroness of many of the leading
literary figures of the time. Among them was a gentleman
of her suite, the French poet Clement Marot (1497-1544),
who later became valet de chambre to Francis I. Marot's
poetic evolution was not unlike that of Venantius Fortun-
atus a thousand years before. He had won fame as a
satirist and writer of exquisite lyrics, amatory and other-
wise : but having come under the influence of the Refor-
mation he turned his muse to sacred subjects and began to
translate the Psalms into French verse. 216 The first of
these translations (of ps. 6) was included in a volume of
poems which he dedicated to his patroness in 1533. He
went on to translate other psalms as well : and his versions,
which could be sung to popular tunes of the time, created
quite a furore at Court. In his charming book, The Psalms
in Human Life, Lord Ernie writes of them as follows :

No one delighted in the santtes chansonnettes more passion-
ately than the Dauphin (afterwards Henry II). ... He sang
them himself with musicians who accompanied his voice on
the viol or lute. To win his favour gentlemen of the Court
begged him to choose for each a psalm. Courtiers adopted
their special psalms, just as they adopted their particular arms,
mottoes or liveries. . . . Diane de Poitiers [the king's mistress]
sang the De profundis (ps. 130) to the air Baisez-moi done, beau

From the Court they spread to the city and the country
generally ; and were unquestionably a considerable factor

125

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

in winning support for the Reformed doctrine and
worship.

In 1542 Marot published 30 of these psalms in a single
volume. The book brought down the wrath of the authori-
ties on the poet. He fled to Geneva, where a new collec-
tion, now containing 50 psalms, was published in 1543.
Marot died next year, leaving the rest of the psalms to be
translated by the great Huguenot divine, Theodore Beza,
who published them at intervals between 1551 and 1562.
In the latter year the complete collection appeared with
the title Les Psaumes mis en rimefranfoise par Clement Marot et
Theodore de Beze. This was the famous "Genevan Psalter",
which for a while was used even in Catholic circles.
Henri II, we are told,

carolled ps. 42, 'Like as the hart,' as he hunted the stag in the
forest of Fontainebleau, riding by the side of Diane, for the
motto of whose portrait he chose the first verse of his favourite
psalm. 218

In the Protestant world it was used not only in France
and Switzerland, but in translated form in Germany,
Holland and Denmark.

For our present purpose the Genevan Psalter is less
interesting from the point of view of its words than of its
music. The English metrical versions of the Psalms were
home-grown products and framed on other lines. The
difference of metres, too, made it difficult (as we shall see)
to adapt the Genevan melodies to the English versions.
Thus even on the musical side the contemporary influence
of the Swiss psalter on English psalmody was with a few
exceptions transient and unimportant. It is only in the
last forty years that the magnificence of the best of the
Genevan melodies has forced compilers to find or
rather to create a place for them in our hymnals. But
in their new surroundings they are becoming so well
known that it is necessary to say something here con-
cerning their origin.

126

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

The 30 psalms published by Marot in 1542 were without
music. But even before that date, a partial metrical psalter
with melodies attached had been published" by Calvin at
Strasburg in 1539. Of the 18 psalms included 12 were by
Marot, but in a form different from that in which they
appeared in his own edition three years later : the rest
were presumably by Calvin himself. Of this book
"Calvin's First Psalter", as it has been called no copy
was for a long time known to exist. But in 1878 M. Douen,
in his work on the Huguenot Psalter, announced that he
had discovered an exemplar of it in the Royal Library
at Munich. Not till 1919, however, was a facsimile of it
published. This was followed in 1932 by an edition by Sir
Richard Terry, 219 with an introduction, harmonizations
and English translations of the psalms included in their
original metres. The tunes in this Strasburg Psalter
would appear to be mostly of German origin adapta-
tions, like many of the German chorales, of mediaeval
German melodies, religious and secular. The only tune in
it that figures in our hymn-books is that of ps. 36 the
splendid sweeping melody to "carry" which Dr. T. A.
Lacey wrote his hymn, C O Faith of England' J544 +246.
It also appears in A.M. set to the words 'From highest
heaven' * 171. It was set in the Anglo-Genevan Psalter of
1561 (see below, p. 146) to the n 3th psalm hence its
English title of 'Old iisth'.

Between 1541 and 1562 the Genevan Psalter gradually
grew towards completeness, and tunes were provided for
the new psalms as they appeared in successive editions.
The musical editor of all these except the first and the last
was Louis Bourgeois (c. 1510-?), one of the most illustrious
names in Christian hymnody. In the edition of 1542 he
altered some of the earlier tunes and substituted new
tunes for others. By the time he had finished his editorship
he had enlarged a psalter with some 30 tunes into one
containing 85 83 for the psalms and 2 for metrical

127

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

versions of the Commandments and the Nunc dimittis
respectively. Of these 10 survived from the Strasburg
Psalter of 1539, while for the rest Bourgeois himself was
responsible, and many of them no doubt were composed
by him. His relations with the Genevan Consistory had,
however, long been uneasy: and at last, failing to win
permission for the introduction of part-singing into the
services, he quitted Geneva and went to Paris. Thus he
had nothing to do with the 40 new tunes accompanying
the 60 new psalms that went to make up the completed
Genevan Psalter of 1562 : and we have no clue to the
authorship of these.

Concerning Bourgeois's work, Dr. Bridges has said :
"Historians who wish to give a true philosophical account
of Calvin's influence at Geneva ought probably to refer
a great part of it to the enthusiasm attendant on the sing-
ing of Bourgeois's melodies." 22 As is only natural, some
of the psalm-tunes written or adapted by him are superior
to others : but the best of them include some of the most
beautiful tunes in our hymnals. Their rather unusual
metrical structure has made it necessary in a number of
cases to provide words specially written to fit them : and
with this objed Dr. Bridges himself in the Yattendon Hymnal
made some of his most precious contributions to English
hymnody. The following appear in E.H. and S.P. : 'Joy
and triumph everlasting' ^200 291 (to ps. 42) ; 'O
gladsome Light' 1269 50 (to Nunc dimittis) : 'The King,
O GOD, his heart to Thee upraiseth' '[564 324 (to ps. 12).
The two former are translations, one from Adam of St.
Viclor, the other of the very early Greek hymn <&a)s
IXapov : the last is stated to be "based on F. R. Tailour",
but the resemblances to Tailour's 1615 version of ps. 21
are so slight that it should be regarded as an original
composition. The tune of ps. 12 appears in A.M. at
*494. Other psalm-tunes by Bourgeois have been
utilized as follows : 'The day Thou gavest' f 277 +56 i

128

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

(The Ten Commandments) ; 'Bread of the world' 1305
|265=*484 (ps. 1 18) ; 'Virgin-born, we bow before Thee'
f 640=$ 12 1 (ps. 86); 'LORD, through this Holy Week'
*647=J538 $347 (ps. no). The tunes by Bourgeois that
found their way into use in England through the metrical
psalters (including the 'Old iooth') will be dealt with in
the next section. Their number was unfortunately very
limited : for, in contrast to the rich metrical variety of the
Genevan Psalter, the English in its early stages was almost
entirely in D.G.M. For another tune from the Genevan
Psalter' (not by Bourgeois) Bridges wrote the words
of 1 66 1, 'Thee will I love, my GOD and King' (ps. 138).
It should be added that for many of the Genevan
psalm-tunes harmonies were provided by another eminent
Protestant musician, Claude Goudimel, who perished in
the massacre of St. Bartholomew in 1572. His arrange-
ments are used in a number of the settings indicated
above.

ii

The history of the English metrical Psalter known as the
"Old Version" is even more complicated than that of the
French. Those who would study its intricacies more closely
are referred to Dr. Frere's authoritative treatment of it in
the Historical Introductions to Hymns A. and M. and to the
articles on the "Old Version" in Julian's Dictionary of
Hymnology and on "Psalter (English Metrical)" in Grove's
Dictionary of Music the latter by H. E. Woolridge. It
must suffice here to give a bare outline of the subjecl.

The first stage in the production of English metrical
versions of the Psalms is a little later in date than Mar of s
corresponding efforts in French. It is associated with the
name of Thomas Sternhold (?-i549), who was groom of
the robes to Henry VIII, even as Marot was valet de
chambre to Francis I. Apart from this and their common
Protestantism, however, there is small similarity between

129

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

the two. Marot was a brilliant French Court poet : Stern-
hold was a plain, pious Englishman who wrote to edify,
not to charm. His aim seems to have been to make sacred
songs for the people in place of the "amorous and obscene
songs" in which they delighted: and for this reason he
cast his versions in the familiar ballad-metre, called
"Common Measure" (C.M.) or "Double Common
Measure" (D.C.M.), when used for hymns. At first,
according to Strype, he wrote for his own "godly solace" :
and would sing his versions to his own accompaniment on
the organ. But, soon after the accession of Edward VI, the
young king chanced to overhear them and insisted on
their being repeated in his presence, A collection of 19
psalms was published : and in a second edition issued in
1549, after Sternhold's death, this number rose to 37
i.e. psalms 1-17, 19-21, with 17 others. All were in D. C.M.
except the 2 5th (D.S.M.) and the isoth (6.6.6.6.6.6.).
Besides these Sternhold would seem to have written
others, for in later editions of the English Psalter versions
additional to those issued in 1549 are attributed to him.

His work was carried on by his principal colleague in
framing the "Old Version", John Hopkins (d. ?i57o). In
1551 Hopkins added 7 new versions to Sternhold's 37.
The book was several times reissued during Edward's
reign. But on the accession of Mary the Reformers had to
flee the country : and the next stages in the evolution of
the English Psalter have their scene at Geneva.

By this time (1553) the Genevan Psalter had come to
include 83 psalms and was still growing. Moreover, the
melodies of Bourgeois were ready to hand. The result was
the issue in 1556 of an enlarged English psalter with tunes.
This formed the central portion of a Forme of prayer and
ministration of the Sacraments., etc. . . . put forward as a rival
to the Book of Common Prayer, which the extremist
exiles assembled at Geneva detested. The number of
psalms had now risen to 51 by the addition of 7 new

13

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

versions, to which was added a version of the Ten Com-
mandments. All these were from the hand of William
Whittingham (? 1524-1 579), later Dean of Durham, who
had married Calvin's sister and was pastor of the Genevan
refugees. The bulk of them were still in D.C.M. : but
ps. 51 and the Commandments introduced L.M., ps. 115
was in D.S.M. and ps. 130 introduced 7. 6. 7. 6D. Each
item had its own tune. The great majority of these pre-
sumably came with the versions themselves fromuEngland :
but the D.C.M. of Sternhold's version of ps. 128 and
Whittingham's versions of the Commandments and
ps. 130 are fitted to the tunes of the corresponding
Genevan versions. The last of these adaptations is
particularly clumsy, as will be seen by a comparison :

f

cr

fond de ma pen - s&

Lord to Thee I make my moan

This example serves to illustrate the difficulties in the
way of using the Genevan tunes for the English versions,
due not only to metrical differences but to the pre-
dominance in the French versions of the "feminine"
double-rhymed ending, ~~ """, which English verse did
not favour.

Of the tunes in this book few, as we shall see, were to
survive for long at all, and only three are familiar to-day.
These are 'Old 44th', 'Old I37th' and the well-known
'Commandments', which last eventually assumed the dull
and debased form represented in *3. In the case of this tune
the use of Bourgeois's original version in f277 is made
possible by the "feminine" ending in lines I and 3 of the
words.

In later editions of the English Psalter the principle of
a different tune for every psalm was abandoned. In 1558
22 tunes disappeared, and 5 more gave way to others.
The English edition of 1560 and the Genevan edition of

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

1561 left the residue untouched : but the English edition
of 1561 still further reduced it, as we shall see.

Meantime, while the tunes decreased, the psalm-
versions increased, in number. The 1558 edition contained
1 1 new ones, to each of which was attached a new tune.
These psalms and their tunes alike showed signs of
Genevan influence : the former in the use of new metres,
the latter in the adaptation of Genevan melodies. In-
cluding the 6 new tunes to the older psalm-versions, the
total of new tunes in this edition was 17. Of these 9 found
a place in the completed Psalter of 1562, 5 of them being
of Genevan origin.

At this point the history of the English Psalter bifurcates
into two streams. On the accession of Elizabeth the
English exiles at Geneva flocked back to their own
country, taking the Psalter with them. For a time there
was doubt as to its legality : but the question was quickly
settled in its favour, and the use of it was regarded as
being covered by the 4Qth of the Royal Injunctions of
1559 (see below, p. 153). "After this," says Dr. Frere, "it,

was natural to regard the book as the ally and colleague
of the Prayer Book." 221

In a new edition issued in 1560 few new psalms were
added: but there were considerable additions to the
appendix, which had hitherto comprised only versions of
the Commandments (1556) and Nunc dimittis (1558).
The former was now companioned by versions of Bene-
diSlus and Magnificat) the Apostles' Creed and the Lord's
Prayer ; while a new version of Nunc dimittis was substi-
tuted for the old. Further, the book showed signs of a new
influence not French this time, but German, and hail-
ing from Strasburg. Two tunes from the Strasburg books
are used for psalms 67 and 125 ; while the version of the
Lord's Prayer (by Bishop Cox) is set to Luther's Voter
unser. The two former were to disappear : but the last was
to remain associated not only with the Lord's Prayer but

132

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

also with ps. 112 for which reason it is known as 'Old
1 1 2th'. It is to be found in *644 t4^ 2 +5^6.

The year 1561 produced two new books one issued
at Geneva, the other in London. The former, edited by
William Kethe, is the parent of the Scottish Psalter : and
more will be said about it in that connection. It is only
necessary to note here that it and its English fellow alike
included for the first time both words and music of the
'Old looth' the words written presumably by Kethe
himself, 222 and the tune one of Bourgeois's. In the English
edition we see Hopkins back at his old task of supple-
menting Sternhold and adding 14 new psalm- versions : to
which must be added 3 posthumous ones by Sternhold
and 4 by other hands, making now 83 psalms in all. The
appendix was further enlarged and now became a prefix
and appendix. The former included versions of the Venite
and Te Deum ; while the latter included certain poetical
oddments which justify Dr. Frere's comment that "the
Psalter was by slow degrees becoming the nucleus of a
hymn-book as well". 223 Here again we may probably see
signs of Lutheran influence.

The slaughter of tunes in this edition has been already
alluded to. Of the tunes of 1556 spared in 1558 9 more
disappeared, along with 7 of the new ones of 1558 and
2 of those of 1560. As against this must be set the intro-
duction of 1 8 new tunes both for the psalms and for
the prefix and appendix.

Next year (1562), with the issue of the book bearing the
title The Whole Booke ofPsalmes collected into Englysh metre,
by T. Starnhold, I. Hopkins and others . . . , the long business
of producing a complete English Psalter was at last brought
to an end : and the "Old Version" reached its final and
standard form. In regard to pss. i 104, Hopkins was
mainly responsible for filling the gaps in the earlier
psalms, and his colleague, Thomas Norton (described by
Wood as "a forward and busy Galvinist"), for filling those

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

in the later. After ps. 104 Kethe's versions made at Geneva
were for the most part adopted where they existed. At the
same time the appendix received 4 further additions. A
considerable number of new tunes were also added and no
further excisions were made. But the poverty of the book
on its musical side may be gauged by the fad that of the
150 psalms only 47 had tunes of their own, while the
remainder had to dress in borrowed plumes.

This musical poverty is revealed not only in the quantity
but also in the quality of the tunes provided. Here, it must
be confessed, the music only matched the text. Fuller's
quaint and caustic verdid on the "Old Version" has
often been quoted:

"Their piety was better than their poetry ; they had drank
more of Jordan than of Helicon. . . . Sometimes they make
the Maker of the tongue speak little better than barbarism,
and have in many verses such poor rhyme that two hammers
bn a smith's anvil would make better music." 224

Even less complimentary is Lord Rochester's epigram
on a parish clerk singing the psalms :

"Sternhold and Hopkins had great Qualms,
When they translated David's Psalms,

To make the heart full glad :
But had it been poor David's Fate
To hear thee sing, and them Translate,
By G , 'twould have made him mad." 2 25

Not only were the words for the most part halting and
uninspiring in themselves, but in place of the rich variety
of the Genevan metres we have a continual repetition of
the dreary jog-trot of D.C.M. Thus it is hardly surprising
that, musically as verbally, the English Psalter is a poor
affair, or that most of its tunes find no place in most of our
hymnals, and few of those that do are very popular. The
D.G.M. tunes are dull and diatonic ; the modal character
of the more interesting of the earlier ones having con-

134

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

demned them to ejedion. 'Old 44th' *2i6 fan +655, 'Old
8ist' *439 J46i Jsi6 and 'Old isyth' *375 1404 526
have managed to survive, and 'Old i8th' 43 and 'Old
22nd' fi63 176 to be revived : but one can hardly say
that their vocal "line" is very exciting. The popular tune,
'StFlavian' *i62 fi6i Ji88, is the first half of the D.C.M.
tune to ps. 132. The tunes written in other metres are
better : and the best of them are admirable. Besides those
already mentioned there are : the wistful 'Old 25th' *i4g

t*49 1*95; ' Old 5 th ' * 66 ; the splendid 'Old iooth'
*i66 1365 443 ; and 'Old i22nd' *303 f 512 J6g6 the
two last by Bourgeois. The well-known S.M. tune, St.
Michael, *yo f27 +702, is an adaptation of 'Old i34th 5 , also
taken from Bourgeois. There remains to be added another
Bourgeois tune, 'Old I24th'. This has always enjoyed
immense popularity in Scotland as wedded to Whitting-
ham's finely-rugged version of the psalm to which Bour-
geois set it, "Now Israel may say and that truly." To
bring it back into use in England E.H. provided two
hymns written ad hoc., fii4, 352. But it is best known in
connection with Clifford Bax's fine poem, 'Turn back, O
man, forswear they foolish ways' 329, which was written
for Gustav Hoist's motet on the tune. The version of the
melody in *7i5 reduces its 5 lines to 4 and so spoils it.

Fortunately the bare cupboard of the 1562 book was to
be restocked in the various collections of psalm-tunes that
for more than half a century were to issue at intervals
from the press as purely private undertakings. Up to 1562
inclusive the music of the metrical psalms was in the form
of melodies only. But in 1563 harmonized settings ap-
peared in the shape of four part-books with the title The
Whole Psalmes, in four paries, which may be song to al musicall
instmmentes, published by John Day, the well-known music
printer. It would appear to have been edited by W.
Parsons ; for he did most of the settings. This book con-
tained not only all the tunes of 1562, in the majority of

K 135

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

cases in two or three alternative settings, but additional
tunes as well, some of them "throw-outs" from earlier
editions of the Psalter, others entirely new. Only one verse
of the words was printed in each case, and the vocal parts
were issued in separate volumes ; for, here as elsewhere,
nothing of the nature of our "scores" was for a long time
to exist. The melody is usually given to the Tenor, but
sometimes to one of the other parts.

This "Day's Psalter" was succeeded in 1579 by
another bearing the name of William Damon, "one of
Her Maiesties Musitions". Damon, however, seems to
have disclaimed responsibility for its settings : and the
book was withdrawn. Only after his death was a new
edition published (in 1591), in which his settings appeared
in an authentic form. In these and other contemporary
collections still to be mentioned we get the first of the four-
line single C.M. tunes, sometimes called "Church tunes",
which were to supplant the majority of the old D.G.M.
tunes. These new tunes were often quarried from the
latter, which lent themselves easily to the purpose. A
similar use was made to some extent of the settings made
by Dr. Christopher Tye for his quite comically doggerel
metrical translation of the first chapters of the Ads of the
Apostles, published in 1553. It is from this source that the
tune 'Windsor' *26y 1332 J 547 ii is probably derived. The
tune 'Southwell 5 *205 177 Jio6 first appears in Damon's
1579 book: and the fine 'Old i20th' *77o 1464 $615,
which was not in the earlier Psalters, is also found there.
Between the two editions of Damon came another
Psalter by John Cosyn (1585) : but it need only be men-
tioned here. Of greater interest is Este's Psalter of 1592, in
which the settings were the work often leading musicians
of the day : 9 of the new four-line tunes are found here,
of which 5 had been in Damon. Of the remainder two are
still in common use : 'Winchester Old' *62 J30 J82 i, and
'Cheshire' *272 t I0 9 + I0 5- Barley's Psalter (undated)

136

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

followed Este closely, but with a larger variety of settings.
In Allison's Psalter of 1599 the 9 "short tunnes" of Este
reappear with i new one. In the settings in this last psalter
the melody is usually in the upper part.

Far more important than any of these is Thomas
Ravenscroft's Whole Booke ofPsalmes of 1621. This carries
on the work of Este and Barley, but contains besides a large
number of new four-line tunes. Hitherto D.G.M. tunes
had preponderated : but now the balance swings over
heavily to the side of the single ones. Este's practice of
giving local names to these is followed, and extended to all.
Here are 'Bristol' *53 f6 62, 'Lincoln' *i43 f 140 {171,
and 'Salisbury' *yio, in the "English" category: and
'St. David' *352 |i66 $301, in the "Welsh". The "Scot-
tish" tunes (which include 'Dundee') are taken from the
Scottish Psalter of 1615 and will be dealt with below. To
ps. 104 is given, in place of the Genevan tune in use since
1561, a new English one, the splendid 'Old io4th' *i67
(178 Jan. Some twenty-four musicians contributed, but
the bulk of the work was done by Ravenscroft himself, who
reset many of the old tunes and set many of the new short
ones. His resetting of the "Old xooth" (to serve for the
"Psalme before Evening Prayer") is given in *i66d fsGsb
*443b. The Dowland setting in Este *:66c fs65c +4430
kept its place for the psalm itself, but in a modified form.

"Ravenscroft's Psalter," says Dr. Frere, "thus repre-
sented the last term in a long development, and the most
popular, though not in all respecls the best, application of
the English art in its heyday to the psalmody of the
Church. It was several times republished and was the
medium through which the tradition was principally
handed on to the later generations." 226 Like the Prayer
Book and the Old Version itself, it went down before the
storm of the triumphant Puritan assault on the Church :
but its influence was to reappear when the old Church
life was built up again after the Restoration.

137

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

It was to help to revive this on its musical side that the
music-publisher John Playford put forth in 1671 his
Psalms and Hymns in Solemn Mustek of Foure Parts on the
Common Tunes to the Psalms in Metre : Used in Parish-Churches.
In the preface he complains thus of the decay of psalmody :

At this day the Best, and almost all the Choice Tunes are
lost, and out of use in our Churches : nor must we exped it
otherwayes, when in and about this great City, in above One
hundred Parishes, there is but few Parish Clerks to be found
that have either Ear or Understanding to set one of these
Tunes Musically as it ought to be.

By way of amending this situation Playford supplied 47
tunes of all sorts, with psalm-versions taken not from the
Old Version only but from other translations as well. The
melody of these is always in the Tenor : the other parts are
two Counter-Tenors and Bass. If trebles are available they
are to sing the melody with the Tenors. In this collection
Playford seems to have worked in independence of
Ravenscroft : and the confusing pradtice is adopted of
assigning new names to several of the four-line tunes. In
addition to the psalms that form the body of the book 1 7
hymns are given: but these will be more conveniently
dealt with in the next chapter.

This first effort of Playford's was not a success. It was,
in fact, too good for the taste and resources of its time. So
six years later he made another attempt on a much less
ambitious scale a small book instead of a stately folio,
with tunes in only three parts and the melody given to the
Treble instead of the Tenor : for he realizes that often
only trebles and basses will be available. Alternative tunes
and versions, too, are provided where the others are too
difficult. In this Whole Book of Psalms both the tunes and
their nomenclature are much closer to Ravenscroft's : but
Playford rejeds most of his Scottish and Welsh tunes
as "outlandish". He includes, however, the fine tune 'St.
Mary' *93 f84 $116, which had appeared in Archdeacon

138

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

Prys's Welsh metrical psalter of 1621 and now found a
place in an English Psalter for the first time. In this form
Playford's book became the standard one in England for
as long as the Old Version held the field.

Before leaving /the subject of these psalm-tunes of the
Old Version it may be well to say something concerning
the manner in which they are set out in the early Psalters.
A criticism frequently directed against nineteenth-century
hymnals is that their versions of these tunes "iron them
out" in such a way as to substitute a monotonous "equal-
note" rhythm for the varied rhythm of the original forms :
and the more recent hymnals take great credit to them-
selves for having "restored" the latter. But the question is
not quite so simple as it appears. Dr. Frere has made care-
ful researches into the subject and expresses his conclusion
thus : "These hymn-tunes, as a rule, in their early form
began each odd line with a long note, and each even line
either with a corresponding long note or else with a
syncopation ; but apart from this there was no uniformity
of rhythm : minims and semibreves alternated in the freest
possible way, and there was evidently nothing very settled
in this respect, since in most tunes variations occur with
every successive edition." 227 Thus it is hard to say that
there is a "correct" version of any tune. Even in regard to
the long note at the beginning of any line, it should be re-
membered that this was primarily intended as a "gather-
ing-note" to help the congregation to get a grip on the
melody of that particular line ; and that the proper degree
of the observance of these notes will depend on the
accentuation of the words. The first foot of an iambic line
may be in practice either an iambus, "" ~~, or a trochee,
~~ "" ; in the former case a shorter note is indicated, in
the latter a longer. The truth of the whole matter appears
to be well summed up by Dr. S. H. Nicholson, when he
says that "it would seem that the psalm-tune in its rhythm
should be regarded (just as the Anglican chant) rather as

139

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a kind of musical formula, applicable to different verses,
than as a set composition of unalterable accent : and as it
seldom happens that all the verses of a hymn are exactly
the same in the arrangement of the accents, it seems reason-
able to give the tune in a form which most nearly matches
in its rhythmic structure the normal form of the line. As
the normal beginning is iambic and not trochaic, it seems
more natural to begin with a short note than a long". 228
Though the Old Version was the principal, it was far
from being the only, metrical psalter that existed in the
period which we have just reviewed. Two may be men-
tioned here on account of the traces that they have left in
the music of our hymn-books. Archbishop Parker, while
lying perdu in Mary's reign, translated the whole Psalter
into various metres, along with the Canticles and the
Veni Creator. This was printed for him in 1567 by Day. Its
main interest for us lies in the 9 tunes by Thomas Tallis
(c. 1510-85) set out at the end of it to provide settings
for Parker's versions. The first 8 form a group, of which
each is in one of the 8 "modes". 4 of these are in D.G.M.,
2 in D.L.M., while the other 2 are in D.S.M. and 6.6.6.6.D
respectively. The set is preceded by the following quaint
description of "The nature of the eyght tunes" :

1 . The first is meeke : devout to see,

2. The second sad : in maiesty,

3. The third doth rage : and roughly brayth,

4. The fourth doth fayne : and flattery playth,

5. The fifth delight : and laugheth the more,

6. The sixth bewayleth : and weepeth full sore,

7. The seventh tredeth stoute : in froward race,

8. The eyghte goeth milde : in modest pace.

The ninth tune is an "extra" and is in 4-line C.M., being
set to the translation of Veni Creator. It is the well-known
'Tallis's Ordinal' *5o8 1453 664. Even more familiar is
the celebrated "Tallis's Canon" *23 1267 45, which is a
cutting down of the 8th tune from 8 lines to 4. Five of the
others have recently been revived those in the ist, 2nd,

140

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

3rd, 5th and yth modes respectively, f 78 625 ; f 3 ;
+^75 j +4^3 ; T4Q6- It may be added that the 3rd mode
melody is the "theme of Thomas Tallis" on which
Vaughan Williams has founded his solemn and moving
'Fantasia' for strings.

These modal tunes of Tallis are beautiful things of their
kind : but it is doubtful whether they can be really said to
come within the category of "hymn-tunes" in the modern
popular sense. They are more appropriate for singing as
little anthems than for congregational use. A note which
Tallis has set at the head of them states that "the Tenor of
these partes be for the people when they will sing alone,
the other parts, put for greater queers [choirs], or to such
as will syng or play them privately e". In point of facl, the
treble part of the original is often more attractive as
melody than the tenor : but as Dr. E. H. Fellowes, the lead-
ing authority on Tudor music, says in a letter to the
present writer which he has kindly given him leave to
quote, "these great composers, writing in four parts,
could make every one of them a melody". He adds :
"Tallis states clearly that both the tenor and the treble
parts are to be regarded as melody for alternative pur-
poses. But in both uses the score must be kept as Tallis
wrote it. It is pedantic and wrong to print these tunes, as
has been done, with the tenor on the top and the treble
part put into the tenor position."

A later metrical psalter which, like Parker's, was for
private use was George Sandys's, of which the 2nd edition
(1638), called A Paraphrase upon the Divine Poems , contained
24 "new tunes for private devotion" by Henry Lawes
(1596-1662) the musician to whom Milton addressed
his sonnet beginning :

Harry, whose tuneful and well measur'd song
First taught our English music how to span
Words with just note and accent, not to scan
With Midas' ears, committing short and long.

141

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

4 of these find a place in both E.H. and S.P. : f 217, 219,
234, 432 ; $22, 227, 589, 290. E.H. has also a fifth :

in

The ever-growing multitude of rival metrical transla-
tions of the Psalter side by side with the Old Version was
for a long time without effecT: in challenging its supremacy.
But meanwhile the dissatisfaction of the polite and edu-
cated world at its patent crudities was steadily growing :
and at the end of the seventeenth century an opportunity
at last came of giving it an authorized successor. This was
the appearance of a new translation from the hands of
two Irishmen the then Poet Laureate, Nahum Tate
(1652-1715) and Dr. Nicholas Brady (i65g-?i726). It was
first published in 1696. William III accepted the dedica-
tion : and it was immediately "allowed" by order of the
King in Council. It should be understood that this "New
Version", as it came to be called, was no more than an
authorized alternative to the Old, "permitted to be used
in all churches, etc., as shall think fit to receive it". The
two rival versions were to go on side by side till the end,
though the popularity of the elder steadily declined, at
least later on.

At first there were few signs that this was to be the case.
The New Version was recommended by the Archbishop
of Canterbury and the Bishop of London. Dr. Bray,
founder of the Society for Promoting Christian Know-
ledge, maintained that the Old was the chief cause of the
decay of psalmody. But the learned Bishop Beveridge
launched a trenchant attack upon the intruder, not only
complaining of the inconvenience of having two versions,
but stressing the superiority of the Old in its fidelity to the
Hebrew and its capacity to be understood by the people,
and denouncing the "fine and modish" character,

142

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

"flourished with wit and fancy", of the New. It was at first
Used only in a few churches in London : and even there
Brady's own church, St. Catharine Gree, cast it out as
"an innovation not to be endured". Dr. Samuel Wesley,
father of John and Charles, while considering it much
superior to the Old, told his curate at Epworth that "they
must be content with their grandsire Sternhold" for the
sake of the people, "who have a strange genius at under-
standing nonsense". 229 The common people certainly did
their best to justify this estimate of their capacities. The
Old Version was regarded by many of them as possessing
not less than a Divine authority. Tate himself tells us how
a maid in his brother's house, refusing to join in family
prayers, explained : "If you must know the plain truth,
Sir : as long as you sung Jesus Christ's psalms, I sung along
with ye : but now that you sing psalms of your own in-
vention, ye may sing by yourselves." 23

The new book was followed in 1700 by a separate
Supplement (designed to be "bound up with the Volume"),
which provided not only additions to the words in the
shape of alternative versions and hymns, but also tunes
which could be used either for the New Version or the
Old. The alternative versions were intended to be used
with the tunes in "peculiar" metre which had become
familiar in connection with the Old Version : the "hymns",
which included the famous Christmas hymn, 'While
shepherds watched', will be spoken of later. The
psalms of the New Version were almost all in the ordinary
metres : and these metres were to be served by a colleclion
of what were called "the Usuall tunes", which were all
those of the earlier metrical Psalters, though sometimes
differently named.

In the 3rd edition (1702) and the 4th (1704) this selec-
tion of tunes was enlarged : and in the 6th edition (1708)
many new tunes were provided and all the tunes arranged
in two parts. This edition is noteworthy for including a

143

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

number of tunes that have attained to classic rank : 'St.
Anne' *i65 J45Q 598, 'Hanover' *43i 1466 J6i8, 'St.
Matthew' *s6g 1526 287 and 'Alfreton' *yi f24o $237.
Its editor is said to have been the eminent Dr. William
Croft (1678-1727), organist of Westminster Abbey: and
there is every reason to believe that the four tunes in
question are from his pen. Later editions followed this of
1708 closely.

From a literary point of view "Tate and Brady" was
generally regarded by contemporary taste as an improve-
ment on " Sternhold and Hopkins" "Ye scoundrel old
bards and a brace of dull knaves", as a satirist of the time
retrospectively addressed the latter. 231 The "wit and
fancy" with which Bishop Beveridge found fault are not
too conspicuous to our eyes : and a modern taste may even
find not very much to choose between the roughness of the
Old Version and the tame smoothness of the New. The
story goes that once Queen Victoria asked Bishop Wilber-
force, "What is a drysalter ? " : to which the Bishop re-
plied "Tate and Brady, Madam". Yet it is not to be
denied that whereas the Old Version has left nothing
behind in our hymnals, to the New we are indebted for
two of our most popular hymns, 'Through all the chang-
ing scenes of life' *2go 1502 $677, and 'As pants the hart'
*238 1367 +449, as well as for three others : 'Thou, Lord,
by strictest search' *658, 'Have mercy, Lord, on me'
*249 J74 and 'O GOD of hosts' *237-

In addition to the Supplement a number of private collec-
tions of psalms and tunes were issued about the same
period. A collection of 1697 for use in St. James', West-
minster, contained the familiar tune, 'St. James' *ig9
T34 1 +965 probably by Ralph Gourteville, organist of that
church. But by far the most important of these collections
was another Playford publication. In 1701 Henry Play-
ford, son of John, first issued his celebrated The Divine
Companion, or David's Harp New Tun'd, being a choice collec-

144

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

tion of Mew and Easy Psalms and Anthems. . . . The signifi-
cance of this volume in its hymnal aspedt will be dealt
with in the next chapter. Here we may mention that
among the new tunes (including 6 by Dr. Blow) appears
for the first time 'Uffingham' *658 1434 +564, by Jeremiah
Clarke (c. 1670-1707). The enlarged 2nd edition of 1709
included three more tunes by Croft, 'Croft's i48th' (or
i36th) *4i4 t565 J657, Winchester' J398 J59 and
'Eatington 5 1639 192, together with 'Brockham 5 *723
f 220 228, 'Tunbridge' *645 f88 474, and the familiar
'St. Magnus' *3oi fi47 175 the two former certainly,
and the last presumably, by Jeremiah Clarke. Concern-
ing the tunes written by Clarke, who became organist of
St. Paul's in 1695 and died by his own hand in 1707,
Dr. Bridges has said that "they are the first in merit of
their kind, as they were the first in time ; and they are
truly national and popular in style." About a generation
later William Knapp (1690-1768), Parish Clerk of
Wareham, Dorset, published his Sett of New Psalm
Tunes and Anthems (1738). This contained the well-known
'Wareham' *63 f475 +631, and the even finer 'Spetis-
bury', so well wedded in A.M. to Bridges's splendid
hymn on the Holy Angels (originally written for the
Tattendon Hymnal to fit another tune), 'All praise be to

The publication of the New Version may thus be said
to mark the beginning of a new advance in the music of
the English Church. With regard to the manner of psalm-
singing at this period two points may be noted. First, the
psalms seem to have been sung at a pace in comparison
with which "the slowest singing of to-day would have
seemed fast". 232 Further, it was usual to interpolate
between the lines of a psalm organ-interludes often of
considerable elaboration. This custom continued till com-
paratively recent times, like the use of the psalm versions
themselves. 233

145

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

IV

A detailed account of the Scottish Psalter lies outside
the scope of the present book. But before concluding this
chapter something may be said about its evolution, both
for the sake of completeness and also on account of the
musical legacies it has left to Anglican hymnals.

The English and the Scottish Psalters, as we have said,
derive from the same parent-stem, and up to the year 1558
their history is identical. From that point, however, the
two diverged, and developed in quite different ways while
retaining a common nucleus. 234 We have already spoken
of the English editions of 1560 and 1561, the two pen-
ultimate stages towards the completed Psalter of 1562.
Concurrently with that of 1561 an "Anglo-Genevan"
Psalter appeared at Geneva intended for the use of the
exiles left behind, and still linked with the Genevan Form
of Prayer. This contained 25 new psalm- versions in addi-
tion to the 62 of 1558, probably all written by William
Kethe (who was presumably a Scot), and most of them
written in metres to fit the Genevan tunes. Some 20 new
tunes were given, all Genevan except for the ' Vater unser'
used for Cox's Lord's Prayer. The Scottish Reformers
adopted this book for their own : and in 1564 a complete
Psalter, The Whole Psalmes of David, was issued as part of
the Presbyterian Book of Common Order. Besides the 87
versions of 1561, 42 were taken from the English Psalter of
1562 and 21 were contributed by two Scots, Robert Pont
and John Craig. The tunes numbered 105 in all, many of
them Genevan a far richer collection than that in the
complete English Psalter.

The Scottish Psalter had no influence on the English
save in one respecl: the four-line C.M. tunes. 235 In 1615
an edition of the Psalter was published by Andro Hart in
Edinburgh containing a supplement of these tunes (called
"Common Tunes"), similar to those given by Este,

146

THE METRICAL PSALTERS

Barley and Allison. They numbered 1 2 and included some
of those in the English books and some others : among
them the 'French Tune', which was rechristened 'Dundee'
by Ravenscroft and has become one of our best-known
tunes, *22i |428 t557; 'The Stilt' (Ravenscroft's 'York')
*237 |4?2 628; and the splendid 'Old Martyrs'
t449 l59?3 Burns's "plaintive Martyrs, worthy of the
name" most worthy, but in truth far more for its
heroic than for its plaintive quality. All of these were in-
corporated by Ravenscroft. Playford for the most part
rejected them : but through Ravenscroft's influence the
three that we have particularized won their way to
popularity in England.

In another book published by Hart's heirs in 1635 the
number of 4-line tunes was increased to 31. One of
these was adopted by Playford in his 1671 collection
and renamed by him 'London New' *373 f394 +503.
Another is 'Caithness' *630 ii, J445 i } +112.

From what has been said in this chapter it will appear
that our debt to the metrical psalters of all lands lies much
more in the department of music than of words. On the
other hand, a far larger proportion of our current hymns
than is generally realized by those who sing them is taken
more or less direct from the psalms. If "Tate and Brady"
have given us few hymns and "Sternhold and Hopkins"
none at all (except the Old Hundredth, which is by some-
body else), Christian poets of all ages since the Reforma-
tion have been successful in transforming the biblical
psalms into English hymns of wide popular appeal. An
attempt is made to give a list of these in Appendix D at
the end of the volume. A glance at this list will suffice to
show how even in the vast and various field of modern
hymn-singing the old-fashioned ideal of "metrical
psalmody" can still find a place.

147

CHAPTER VII

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO THE TIME
OF WATTS

IN England as in other countries a vernacular hymnody
grew up during the Middle Ages side by side with the
Latin hymnody of the liturgical services. The first
beginnings of this go back far into Anglo-Saxon times.
Bede's charming story 236 is well known, telling how
Caedmon, a lay brother in St. Hilda's monastery at
Whitby, leaving the festive board one night because of his
inability to take his turn at singing and withdrawing to
the stable to watch the horses, heard in a dream the com-
mand, "Caedmon, sing," and was at once inspired to
compose a hymn "to the praise of GOD" which he recited
to the Abbess and his brethren next morning. Bede goes
on to relate how afterwards in the exercise of his new gift
Caedmon turned into verse "the whole series of sacred
history". Another story 237 concerns a contemporary of
Caedmon, St. Aldhelm, Bishop of Sherborne (d. 709).
Being distressed, when Abbot of Malmesbury, by the un-
willingness of the Wessex folk to hear sermons, he took his
station on the bridge over the Avon, and there, minstrel-
wise, sang to the people lively songs of his own making
until a crowd collected, whereupon he changed his strain
to a graver and religious note. Lays attributed to Aldhelm
were still sung in the days of King Alfred, who deemed
him superior to any other native poet. Like Aldhelm,
Alfred himself was poet and scholar : and to him is attri-

148

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

buted the Anglo-Saxon original of a hymn in A.M., 'O
GOD our Maker, throned on high' *664.

The closing centuries of the Middle Ages produced in
our country a remarkable efflorescence of sacred poetry
marked by a tender and passionate piety that we hardly
find it easy in these days to associate with the English
character. Its most salient feature is an intense personal
love of our Lord, which delights to contemplate Him as
Lover of men and Redeemer and to dwell on the details
of His Passion. Side by side with this goes a no less fervent
devotion to His Mother. The leading figure in this school
is the fourteenth-century Yorkshire hermit and mystic,
Richard Rolle of Hampole (1290-1349), of whom it has
been said that "Jesus is to him the one passion". His
voluminous writings include both prose and verse. Of the
poems of Rolle and his like no complete collection as yet
exists : but a large number of them have been printed in
various scholarly editions. The cream of them is collected
and reproduced with just enough of modernization in
the language to make them easily intelligible to the
ordinary reader in Miss Frances Comper's beautiful
volume recently published with the title Spiritual Songs
from English MSS. of Fourteenth to Sixteenth Centuries. Two
short examples taken from this collection may be set down
here as illustrative of the general character of these poems.
The first is a little song by Richard Rolle :

Jhesu that died on the rood

for the love of me,

and bought me with thy precious blood,

thou have mercy of me.

What me lets of any thing
for to love thee,
be it me lief, be it me loth,
do it away from me.

The second example consists of three of the eight verses

H9

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

of a Prayer to Jesus that bears the name of Richard de
Caistre, a Norwich priest who died in 1420 :

Jhesu, for thy woundis smart

Of thy feet and handen two,
Make me meek and low of heart

And thee to love as I should do.

Jhesu, Lord that madest me

And with thy blessed blood me bought,

Forgive that I" have grieved thee
With worde, worke, will and thought.

Jhesu, in whom is all my trust,

That died upon the rood-tree,
Withdraw my heart fro fleshly lust,

From covetise and vanity. 238

Concerning such poems Miss Comper says that "many
were set to music, and others, judging by their lilt and
rhythm, may have been sung. For friars and monks, and
no doubt anchoresses and nuns also, as well as trouba-
dours, sang their spiritual love ditties to simple instru-
ments of their own devising". 239 But we have no proof
that they were used as "hymns" in the sense of being sung
in church. They were apparently intended in many cases
to be used as silent devotions at Mass. The case is other-
wise with the carols for Christmas and other sacred seasons
which England, like the other countries of Western
Europe, produced in abundance in the later Middle
Ages. Here, too, not only the words have survived, but
in many cases the music also. We cannot deal with these
carols here beyond saying that they often breathe the
same tender fervour as the poems mentioned above, and
that their rediscovery and publication in many collections
of carols of the last generation have brought a wonderful
enrichment of our native sacred song, and resulted in a
large-scale eviction of the faded sentimentalities that

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ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

masqueraded under the title of carol in the Victorian
age. But we may cite as examples the exquisite poem 'I
sing of a maiden that is makeles' (dating from the fifth-
teen th century), and the two lovely carols in the Coventry
Nativity Play, 'This endris night' and 'Lullay, lullay, thou
little tiny child'. The contemporary tune of the second
of these three is used in |20 $72.

ii

During the two centuries that followed the Reformation
the Church of England had practically nothing to show
in the way of congregational hymnody apart from metrical
versions of the Psalter. In the first stage of the reforming
movement there seemed a momentary possibility of its
developing a hymnody on the Lutheran model. Evidence
of this is the volume called Goostly Psalmes and Spiritualle
Songs, 240 of which an unique copy exists in the library of
Queen's College, Oxford. It is the work of the translator
of the Bible, Miles Coverdale, who was made Bishop of
Exeter in 1551. It was published in the reign of Henry
VIII : but the exact date is uncertain. The preface thus
indicates its object :

Would GOD our carters and ploughmen (had none) other
thing to whistle upon save psalms . . . and if women . . .
spinning at the wheels had none other songs . . . they should be
better occupied than with hey nony nony, hey troly loly.

a characteristic anticipation of the later Puritan attitude
towards secular folk-song. The 41 items contained in it
include 15 versions of the psalms, together with para-
phrases of the Commandments, Creed, Lord's Prayer,
Media vita ('In the midst of life'), Gloria in excelsis, Mag-
nificat) Nunc dimittis, Christe qui lux and Veni Creator
sometimes more than one of a single original. Of the re-
maining 15 items, 13 are English translations of German
hymns of the Reformation. The first verse of one of these,
'Crist is now risen agayne', was quoted in an earlier
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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

chapter. The other two of the 15 "hymns" would seem to
be of native origin viz. a hymn to the Holy Spirit
(based on the Veni Creator), and one that begins with the
uncompromising sentiment, 'Let go the whore of Babilon'!
Apart from these two it would appear that not the hymns
only but all the contents of the volume are translated from
German originals.

A further proof that the pioneers of the English Refor-
mation intended to make hymns a part of Divine Service
is supplied by the well-known letter of Granmer to
Henry VIII, dated Oct. 7, 1544 (or 1545). The Arch-
bishop writes :

I have translated into the English Tongue, so well as I could
in so short time, certain processions, to be used upon festival
days. . . . If your grace command some devout and solemn
note to be made thereunto ... I trust it will much excitate and
stir the hearts of all men unto devotion and godliness. But in
mine opinion the song that shall be made thereunto would not
be full of notes, but, as near as may be, for every syllable a note,
so that it may be sung distinctly and devoutly. ... As concern-
ing the Salve festa dies the Latin note, as I think, is sober and
distinct enough : wherefore I have travailed to make the
verses in English and have put the Latin note unto the same.
Nevertheless they that be cunning in singing can make a much
more solemn note thereto. I made them only for proof to see
how English would do in song. But, by cause mine English
verses want the grace and facility that I could wish they had,
your majesty may cause some other to make them again that
can do the same in more pleasant English and phrase. 241

For some reason, however (we may conjecture that the
influence of Galvin had something to do with it), nothing
more came of the matter : and in the successive editions
of the Book of Common Prayer the only hymns that
appear are the translations of the Veni Creator in the
Ordinal (see pp. 81, 159). On the other hand, the Primers
issued for private devotion did include hymns. Rough
versions of Latin hymns had already figured in the pre-
Reformation Sarum Primers : and they are also to be

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

found in the Primers of Henry VIII, which doubtless
passed through Cranmer's hands. In Edward VI's Primer
of 1553 they are excluded, no doubt deliberately: but
they reappear in Elizabeth's Primer of 1559, which was
based on those of Henry VIII. The use of hymns, whether
translations from the Latin or otherwise, is envisaged by
the 49th of the Royal Injunctions of 1559, which permits

that in the beginning, or in the end of common prayers, either
at morning or evening, there may be sung a hymn, or such-
like song ... in the best sort of melody and music that may
be conveniently devised, having regard that the sentence of
the hymn may be understood and perceived. 242

But by this time the people had taken a fancy for singing
metrical psalms : and no doubt the influence of the
Reformers newly come back from Geneva was adverse to
the use of anything else. The Old Version of Sternhold and
Hopkins quickly acquired an almost canonical authority ;
and held the field to the virtual exclusion of the experi-
ments on Latin or Lutheran models which a decade or
two earlier had seemed to have a future before them.

Only through the back-door of the appendices to the
successive editions of the Psalter was it possible for a few
hymns to make a shy and tentative re-entry in that psalm-
ridden age. In that of 1561 appears the "Humble Suit
of a Sinner", 'O Lord, turn not away Thy face' *93
|84 Jn6, which still holds its place in our hymn-books ;
along with five other hymns (two of them translations
of Lutheran originals) that have sunk beneath the
stream of time. In 1562 the "Humble Suit" reappears,
now rechristened "The Lamentation of a Sinner" and
with the name of J. Marckant attached to it, together
with two more hymns in a similar penitential key.

For a long time no addition was to be made to this
beggarly repertory. The Church of England had to rest
content with the Old Version and its meagre doggerel

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Supplement. It may seem strange that a Church that
possessed so magnificent a prose liturgy as the Book of
Common Prayer should have been satisfied to be so poorly
equipped on the poetical side of its worship. But here the
Genevan influence reigned supreme. The Prayer Book it
had to accept as a, fait accompli, along with the noble build-
ings inherited from the Middle Ages, while at the same
time doing its best to reduce to a minimum the appeal of
both to the aesthetic sensibilities of its victims. But so far
as Church song was concerned, its pet principle of "The
Bible and the Bible only" held the field. Thus the superb
poetical outburst of the Elizabethan Age expressed such
religious aspiration as it could show in elaborate forms un-
intended and unsuitable for Church use. For Spenser, as
for Milton more than a generation later, a "Hymn" is
simply a religious ode. The only trace that the age has
left in our hymn-books consists of a few treasures that have
recently been made to serve a purpose for which they were
not designed and are not always well-fitted. The Sunday
hymn 'Most glorious Lord of life' 1283 22 is a sonnet of
Spenser's : and S.P. has made similar but far less appro-
priate use of one of Shakespeare's sonnets, 'Poor soul, the
centre of my sinful earth' +622, and of the exquisite song
of Edmund Campion, 'Never weather-beaten sail' +587.
More suitable for use as hymns are three other poems in
the same collection : a second song of Campion's, 'Sing a
song of joy' 639, Thomas Gascoigne's 'You that have
spent the silent night' 38, and Sir H. Wotton's 'How
happy is he born and taught' 524, with Sir Philip Sidney's
beautiful paraphrase of ps. 139, 'O Lord, in me there
lieth naught' 605.

Apart from these the only Elizabethan hymn in our
collections and the only one of them all that has as yet
come into common use is of Roman Catholic origin :
'Jerusalem my happy home.' 243 The version of it in A.M.
is a rewritten fragment. The whole is given in 1638

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

+395> an d is exquisitely quaint and charming. Its author-
ship is more or less a mystery, as to which there has been
much conjecture but can be no certainty. It is found in a
MS. book in the British Museum. The MS. is undated ;
but appears to belong to the end of the sixteenth or be-
ginning of the seventeenth century. The poem is headed,
'A song made by F.B.P. to the tune of Diana'. It was first
printed in 1601 in a volume entitled The Song of Mary the
Mother of Christ . . . with the Description of Heavenly Jerusalem.
In this version the number of stanzas is reduced from 26 to
19, and there are many variants from the original MS.
text if it be the original and not another form of a still
earlier version. Inasmuch as the British Museum MS. con-
tains several other pieces of poetry evidently written by
Roman Catholics, it has been suggested that F.B.P. was a
vidim of the persecution of Roman Catholics under
Elizabeth or James I. The further suggestion has been
made that the initials stand for Francis Baker, Pater (or
Priest) : but there seems to be no proof of this whatever.
The writer was presumably a Roman Catholic and
possibly a priest that is all that we can say. There is a
striking general resemblance between his poem and
another on the same subjed of the Heavenly Jerusalem by
W. Prid (first published in 1585), a cento from which
appears in S.P. +393. The likeness may be due to the fad
that both are apparently based on a passage describing
the joys of heaven in a book of Meditations ascribed to St.
Augustine which was very popular in the sixteenth
century.

The Jacobean and Caroline periods were hardly less
barren in the sphere of hymnody than the Elizabethan :
for the tyranny of the Genevan principle still held firm.
It is true that our modern hymnals contain a certain
number of hymns of this date : but the poets whose names
they bear wrote these lyrics for their own satisfadion and
that of the literary public, not with an eye to liturgical

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

use. This, for example, is the case with George Herbert
(1593-1633). Not only were his poems not written to be
sung in church, but most of them are quite unsuited
to the purpose by reason of the elaborate and fan-
tastic imagery which Herbert shared with the other poets
of his time, and also on account of their peculiar metres.
One could wish that this were not so : for no poet quite so
perfectly expresses the characteristic Anglican mentality
at its best as this exquisite combination of the poet, the
scholar, the gentleman and the saint the scion of a
great house who after a brilliant career at Cambridge,
where he was Public Orator, retired to the little village of
Bemerton near Salisbury to end his short life as a model
parish priest. On the other hand, the few poems of his
that have come into use as hymns are in every way worthy
of their place, and three of them at least have won wide
popularity. They include the splendid 'Antiphon', 'Let
all the world in every corner sing' *548 1427 +556, 'King
of glory, King of peace' *665 1424 +553, 'Teach me, my
GOD and King', 1485 652, 'Come, my Way, my Truth,
my Life' 474, and the lovely paraphrase of the 23rd
psalm, 'The GOD of love my Shepherd is' 1 93 653.

A senior contemporary of Herbert was John Donne
(1573-1631), the famous Dean of St. Paul's. His poem
(written during the illness which was the occasion of his
volume of Devotions] , 'Wilt Thou forgive that sin where I
begun' 123 = 1515, nas been of late years turned to use as
a hymn. Concerning it Izaak Walton tells us in his Life
of the author that after his recovery "he caused it to be
set to a most grave and solemn tune, and to be often sung
by the Choristers of St. Paul's Church, in his own hearing ;
especially at the Evening Service" 244 as a kind of
anthem, we may assume. Fine and deeply felt poem
though it be, it can hardly be regarded as entirely suitable
for general congregational use.

Other poets of the time whose poems have been used as

156

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

hymns include Robert Herrick ('In the hour of my
distress' f4 10 ) > Phineas Fletcher ('Drop, drop, slow tears'
f 98 +125) ; Henry Vaughan the Silurist ('My soul, there is
a country' +5^5) 5 Thomas Pestel, Charles Fs Chaplain in
Ordinary, evicled by the Roundheads in 1646 ('Behold,
the great Creator makes' f 20 72) ; and Sir Thomas
Browne ('The night is come like to the day' $58). The
similarity of the last-named hymn to Ken's Evening Hymn
will be referred to later. The 19 psalm-paraphrases by the
great John Milton (1608-74), of which 'Let us with a
gladsome mind' j 532 Jia, and 'The Lord will come and
not be slow' f 492 +658, are two specimens, may have been
in part written with a view to a new Puritan psalter. Sir
H. W. Baker's harvest hymn, 'Praise, O praise our GOD
and King' *38i, is based upon the former, which was
written by the poet at the age of fifteen.

For a brief moment in the first half of the seventeenth
century the monopoly of the Old Version seemed to be
threatened and the possibility of a large development of
hymnody proper appeared on the horizon, only to be
quickly eclipsed. In 1623 George Wither (1588-1667)
published his Hymnes and Songs of the Church,*^ 5 a book
which has been described as "the earliest attempt at an
English hymn-book". It was accompanied by a number of
tunes by the foremost English musician of the age, Orlando
Gibbons (1583-1625). These tunes, which are in various
metres and are set out in two parts, treble and bass,
number 16 in all: but some of them are only different
versions of a single tune. The book was at first received
with high favour at Court and elsewhere : and the author
obtained a patent from the King, ordering it to be bound
up with the Old Version wherever this was in use. The
first part consisted of metrical paraphrases o Scripture ;
the second of hymns for the Festivals, Seasons and Holy
Days of the Prayer Book, and also for Special Occasions,
together with a long hymn for use at the administration of

157

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Holy Communion. But despite the approval of the King
and of leading Churchmen, Wither's book aroused bitter
opposition. The Stationers' Company, which had a
monopoly of the Old Version, contrived to make the
patent nugatory : and it was withdrawn by the Council in
1634. Later Wither went over to the Parliament side and
eventually became one of Cromwell's Major-Generals .
The story goes that, when he was taken prisoner by the
Royalists, Sir John Denham saved his life by pleading
that "his Majesty must not hang George Wither, for so
long as he lives no one will account me the worst poet in
England". This anecdote and Pope's name for him
"wretched Withers (sic)" hardly suggest for him a high
rank as poet : but his writings contain good stuff as well as
bad. "Wither," said Lord Selborne, "wrote, generally, in a
pure nervous English idiom, and preferred the reputation
of 'rusticity' (an epithet applied to him even by Baxter) to
the tricks and artifices of poetical style which were then in
favour." 246 S.P. contains three of his hymns : the "Sun-
set Hymn", 'Behold the sun that seem'd but now' 43
(also *4y6) , 'To GOD with heart and cheerful voice' +176
and 'The Lord of heaven confess' 657. It should be added
that Gibbons's tunes shared the fate of the hymns they
companioned and were entirely neglefted for many
generations, apart from 'Angels' or 'Angel's Song' 1259
29 (the version in *8 is spoilt) so called because
originally set to a song beginning 'Thus angels sung, and
thus sing we' which got into general use through its
inclusion in Playford's collection of 1671. But in recent
years they have won wide admiration and currency, and
assuredly may take rank among the most beautiful, not of
English hymn-tunes only, but of those of all lands. S.P.
gives no less than 1 1 of them : 29, 103, 125, 134, 204, 261,

485, 574> 584, 6 4 (i), 6 48.
In 1627 the saintly John Cosin (1564-1672), who was

to become Bishop of Durham at the Restoration, first pub-

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ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

lished his Collection of Private Devotions in the Practice of the
Ancient Church called the Hours of Prayer. This (as its name
indicates) was intended for private use, like the old
Primers, the successor of which it claimed to be. Its exten-
sive employment of patristic and mediaeval material (in-
cluding translations of old Latin Office hymns) brought
down upon it the virulent attacks of the Puritan party
Prynne nicknamed it "Mr. Cozens His Gouzening Devo-
tions" : and even after the Restoration its vogue and
influence were limited. But one of its translations won the
signal honour of being included in the Ordinal of the
Prayer Book of 1661 the version (or, rather, para-
phrase) of the "Hymn for the Third Hour", Veni Creator
Spiritus, which was then provided in addition to the dull
C.M. version that had done duty alone since 1549 (p. 81).

This, however, was merely a matter of supplying an
alternative for something that was already there. The
Church's triumph over Puritanism at the Restoration
brought with it no extension of the province of hymnody
in Anglican worship. The Old Version still provided all
that was deemed necessary in this resped. On the other
hand, it was during the Restoration period that the first
tentative steps were taken towards the evolution of the
"English hymn" in the sense in which we now understand
the phrase. This process manifested itself in two directions.

i. The first of these is the extension of the principle of
metrical translation or paraphrase from the Psalter to
other portions of Scripture. The appendix to the Old
Version had already done this in regard to the Gospel
Canticles: and during the Commonwealth period
attempts were made both in England and in Scotland to
apply the same principle more widely. Of the English
attempts the most notable is connected with the name of
William Barton (c. 1603-1678), a Puritan divine who con-
formed to the Anglican settlement after the Restoration.
Of him Dr. Louis Benson has remarked that "he stands at,

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

and it must be said, he crosses the dividing line between
the old Psalmody and the new Hymnody". 247 His contri-
bution took the form of a collection of hymns, each of
which consisted of selected texts and passages of Scripture
turned into verse and woven into a single whole. Barton's
first Century of seled hymns framed on these lines was pub-
lished in 1659. In 1670 this had expanded into Two
Centuries, and in 1688 (after his death) the whole collection
was published as Six Centuries. In the Anglican Church
Barton's experiment had small success : but it was widely
taken up by the Independents and undoubtedly prepared
the way for the later epoch-making achievement of Dr.
Watts. Indeed, to quote Dr. Benson again, "there was no
essential difference between Barton's hymns collected out
of Scripture and the succeeding hymns based upon
Scripture". 248

2. A parallel and more permanently important de-
velopment is seen in the appearance during the Restora-
tion period of a number of works by various authors
which, though originally designed for private use only, did
much to fix the type of the English hymn as it ultimately
established itself, and have in fa6l made important contri-
butions to our current hymnody. The earliest of these was
a little volume published in 1 664 with the title The Toung
Man's Meditation, or some few Sacred Poems upon Selett Subjetts
and Scriptures. This was the work of Samuel Grossman, a
divine concerning whom our chief information comes
from a passage in Wood's Athenae Oxonienses.^^ He was
born in 1623-4 in Suffolk, and was a Bachelor of Divinity
of Cambridge University. He was appointed Prebendary
of Bristol Cathedral and died, aged 59, on Feb. 4, 1683,
a few weeks after his appointment as Dean. Among the
poems in his book is the deservedly popular hymn 'Jeru-
salem on high' *233 f4ii +197, which forms the second
part of a poem on Heaven of which the first part begins,
'Sweet place, sweet place alone'. Another hymn in the

1 60

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

same collection and written in the same fine striding
metre (already employed in some of the old psalm-
versions) is 'My song is love unknown' t I2 7- This is a
hymn of remarkable beauty and breathing real religious
passion : and it thoroughly deserves to share the popu-
larity of its better-known companion. Taken over by S.P.
from the Public School H.B., where (with John Ireland's
fine tune) it first appeared, it ranks as one of the most
precious additions to our hymnody.

Another of these welcome contributions comes from a
book, Divine Dialogues with Divine Hymns, published in 1668
by Dr. Henry More (i6i4-?87), the Cambridge Platonist
who figures as one of the characters in John Inglesant. John
Wesley was an admirer of More's book. He took it with him
on his visit to Georgia in 1735, and later made one of its
hymns into two for congregational use. The beautiful
Christmas hymn in S.P., 'The holy Son of GOD most high'
$80, consists of 4 of the i o stanzas of More's first Hymn.

The same year, 1668, saw the publication in Paris of a
book by a Roman Catholic convert, John Austin (1613-
69), bearing the title Devotions in the Antient Way of Offices.
It was to have considerable influence in Anglican circles;
for more than one adaptation of it was made for the use of
English Churchmen. Even before this was done Playford
had taken the rather surprising step of including a number
of its contents in his first book of 1671. Probably this had
something to do with the failure of his venture. In any
case it is only recently that Austin's hymns have come into
public use. Two of them appear in S.P. the charming
'Hark, my soul, how everything' 19 (also | 2 9^) and
'Hail, glorious spirits, heirs of light' +205.

Far more famous than any of the hymns derived from
these Restoration collections are two that were pre-
sumably written about the same time the "Morning"
and "Evening Hymns" of Thomas Ken (1637-1711), the
admirable divine who was appointed Bishop of Bath and

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Wells in 1685 and resigned his see four years later rather
than acknowledge the "usurper" William III. They are :
'Awake, my soul, and with the sun' *3 fssy 25, and
'Glory to Thee, my GOD, this night' *23 J267 45, The
exad date when they made their first appearance is un-
certain : 25 but they would seem to have been in limited
use in 1674, for they are apparently referred to in a
Manual of Prayers for the Use of the Scholars of Winchester
College which Ken, then Prebendary of Winchester, pub-
lished in that year, and in which he says : "Be sure to sing
the Morning and Evening Hymn in your chamber de-
voutly." The hymns themselves are not given in the 1674
Manual nor in successive editions until that of 1695, when
they were added as an appendix along with a third, less
well-known, called a " Midnight Hymn." The question
of their date and exact text is complicated, and need not
be dealt with here except in so far as it affects that of
Ken's alleged " plagiarism." There are (as we have said)
indisputable resemblances between the Evening Hymn
and Sir Thomas Browne's " dormitive " in Religio Medici
(i643) 251 ; as also between the Morning Hymn and a poem
by Thomas Flatman published in 1674. It may well be,
however, that each of the three authors (all Wykehamists)
were no more than harking back, consciously or uncon-
sciously, to the Latin hymns for Prime and Compline
then still in use at College Prayers at Winchester. Even
more striking is the resemblance between Ken's hymns
and two metrical prayers given at the end of a little book,
Verbum Sempiternum, published in 1693. This book was a
reprint of a poem by John Taylor, originally published
in 1614 ; but the two prayers do not appear till 1693 and
there is no reason to think that they are by Taylor. On
the other hand, there seems to be no doubt that Ken's
hymns were written and circulated long before they were
included in the 1695 Manual. It was indeed the existence
of pirated editions that led Ken to publish an authorized

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ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

text. 252 Once put into general currency Ken's Morning
and Evening Hymns became immensely popular and
eventually came to be inserted in the Supplement to the
New Version. No hymns are more familiar to Christians
of all denominations throughout the English-speaking
world : and none more deserve their popularity. No one
would call them great poetry : but they have the simple
yet dignified eloquence that belongs to the best popular
hymns.

Ken's famous hymns, written by an Anglican for
Anglicans, have always been not less favoured by Non-
conformists. In the case of two writers who were his con-
temporaries the borrowing is the other way. No hymn has
more quickly achieved popularity in our generation than
the 'Pilgrim's Song' of the great-hearted Baptist tinker
John Bunyan (1628-88), taken from the concluding
portion of the second part of the Pilgrim's Progress. It is
best known in the form in which it appears in E.H., which
first gave it currency : 'He who would valiant be' f402
(also 515). But this version departs considerably from
Bunyan's own, which is given in A.M., 'Who would true
valour see ? ' *676. Whether the changes were either
necessary or an improvement is a matter on which each
man must form his own opinion. The rapid popularity
won by the hymn is of course not a little due to the singu-
larly happy folk-tune that has come to be usually associ-
ated with it a discovery of Vaughan Williams. 263 In
A.M. Bunyan's hymn is set to a tune to the words 'Re-
member, O thou man' from Ravenscroft's Melismata,
which may have been in Bunyan's mind when he wrote
the hymn and have suggested its metre. S.P. contains also
a second hymn by Bunyan the song sung by the shep-
herd boy "in very mean Cloaths but of a very fresh and
well-favoured Countenance" in the same part of the
Pilgrim's Progress, 'He that is down needs fear no fall' 513.
Another Nonconformist writer of the Restoration period

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

who has helped to enrich our Anglican hymnals is Richard
Baxter (1615-91), the saintly author of the once famous
work of piety, The Saints' Everlasting Rest. Formerly chap-
lain to one of Cromwell's regiments, he became at the
Restoration Chaplain to Charles II and refused the see of
Hereford. But on the passing of the Acl of Uniformity he
left the Church of England and became a Nonconformist
Minister. His hymns include : 'Lord, it belongs not to my
care' *535 1433 ^105, 'He wants not friends that hath
Thy love' |40i 514 and 'Christ who knows all His sheep'
288. His most famous hymn, however, 'Ye holy angels
bright' *546 1517 +701, is only partly his. It was re-
written by J. Hampden Gurney in his Church Psalmody
(1838), and the two last verses seem to be by him. 254 Its
fine tune, "DarwalPs i48th", is one of the 150 tunes com-
posed by the Rev. H. Darwall for the complete metrical
psalter, and was first published in 1770.

One more hymn-writer of the Restoration deserves to
be mentioned, not only because of what he wrote but even
more because he seems to have been one of the first
Anglican clergymen to favour the practice of hymn-singing
in Church, as distinct from the use of metrical psalms.
This is John Mason (c. 1645-94), 266 the son of a Non-
conformist minister, who became Vicar of Stantonbury,
Bucks, in 1668, and later Redor of Water Stratford in the
same county. He was described as "a light in the pulpit
and a pattern out of it". His Spiritual Songs, or Songs of
Praise to Almighty God were first published in 1683. The
noble hymn, 'How shall I sing that majesty' 1404 $526, is
by him. S.P. also includes a second : 'Thou wast, O GOD,
and Thou wast blest' 675. Another of his hymns appears
to supply the basis of Keble's, 'A living stream of crystal
clear' *2i3.

Our account of the sacred poets of the Restoration
period makes it clear that the debt of our modern hymnals
to them is considerable : nor should we omit to mention

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ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

in addition the four fine hymns first published in the
Spectator a generation later (1712) by the poet and essayist
Joseph Addison (1672-1719) : 'When all Thy mercies,
O my GOD' *5i7 fsii 694, 'The spacious firmament
on high' *662 J2Q7 +659, 'How are Thy servants blest,
O Lord' J542 $522, and the beautiful "classically-
embroidered" version of ps. 23, 'The Lord my pasture
shall prepare' J4gi 656. But it must be repeated that
nearly all these hymns, at the time when they were
produced, were neither intended nor employed for use in
public worship. The official provision of "hymns" proper,
as apart from metrical psalms, was still confined to the
meagre contents of the appendices of the Old and (when
it arrived) the New Versions. The first Supplement to the
latter, issued in 1700, contained, in addition to versions of
the Canticles, Commandments, etc., and the Veni Creator,
six hymns, one for Christmas, two for Easter and three
for Holy Communion. The Christmas hymn is the favour-
ite 'While shepherds watched' *62 J30 82 a versifi-
cation of St. Luke ii. 8-14. To these the 6th edition
(1708) added three more, including a revised text of
Marckant's "Lamentation." A rather richer hymnody
was included in Henry Playford's The Divine Companion,
issued in 1701, which contained 12 hymns taken from
Crashaw, George Herbert, Austin and William Drum-
mond. These 12 were increased to 17 in the second
edition of 1 709, along with 4 hymns for Christmas Day,
Good Friday, Easter Day and Whitsunday. But the day of
hymn-singing in Church on a large scale was still far off.
In this department of religious life it was not the Church
of England but the bodies separated from her that were
to be the effective pioneers.

in

"The English Independents, as represented by Dr.
Watts," wrote Lord Selborne nearly 60 years ago, "have

165

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a just claim to be considered the real founders of modern
English hymnody. Watts was the first to understand the
nature of the want ; and ... he led the way in providing
for it." 256 This statement needs a certain amount of
qualification in the light of fuller knowledge. We have
already mentioned Barton and Mason, both of whom
were clergymen of the Established Church, though the
use of their hymns was practically confined to the Non-
conformists. Among the Baptists, too, a sedional move-
ment in favour of hymn-singing began about 1675, associ-
ated with the name of Benjamin Keach, who, in a pamph-
let published in 1691, undertook the defence of a practice
which for a time seriously divided the Baptist body. A
similar practice arose about the same time among the
Independents (the ancestors of the Gongregationalists of
to-day), whose earliest hymn-colledions date from the
last decade of the seventeenth century. But these early
efforts only have significance for us in that they helped to
prepare the way for the success of Watts's "System of
Praise". 257 For him it was reserved to overthrow the
tyranny of Psalmody by the practical and obvious method
of putting something better in its place "a Hymnody",
to quote Dr. Louis Benson, "that satisfied the religious
sentiment more completely, and yet retained a sufficiency
of the familiar form and tone of the accustomed
psalm". 258 It is indeed hardly an exaggeration to com-
pare Watts with St. Ambrose. Like his illustrious proto-
type, he at the same time secured the triumph of Hymnody,
made important and imperishable contributions to it and
permanently influenced the form which it was to assume
in the generations that followed.

It is easy to poke fun at Watts : and he is in fad rather a
favourite target for our contemporary sense of humour.
But we shall resist the temptation to enliven our pages by
quoting his more absurd and repellent lines, which are
specially abundant, unfortunately, in his Hymns for Little

1 66

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

Children. A man's genius is assessed not by his worst work
but by his best. Watts shared the weaknesses of his time
not only in its theology, with its over-insistence on the
motive of self-regarding fear, but even more in its taste for
an artificial and bombastic literary style. What is not
sufficiently recognized is how often in both respeds he
rose above it. One of his main objections to the exclusive
use of metrical psalms is precisely that, representing as
they do the produds of a pre-Christian era, they cannot
voice the Christian spirit. Concerning them he declares
roundly in an Essay printed in the 1 707 volume of his
Hymns:

\

Some of 'em are almost opposite to the Spirit of the Gospel :
Many of them foreign to the State of the New-Testament,
and widely different from the present Circumstances of Chris-
tians. . . . Thus by keeping too close to David in the House of
GOD, the vail of Moses is thrown over our Hearts. 259

The hymns of Christians should freely express their own
spiritual experience, not "the thoughts of David or
Asaph". Thus the tyranny of the Genevan principle of
"The Bible and the Bible only" was swept away. Again, in
the matter of literary style Watts was capable of an admir-
able simplicity of expression when his purpose was to
edify the simple (always in reality his chief preoccupation)
rather than to charm the polite. "It will be found," it has
been acutely remarked, "that just in those pieces where
he is conscious of a refined audience on one side and the
unlettered congregation on the other, Watts' s best work
appears." 26 In his hymns he adheres for the most part
to the old metres that had been consecrated by the psalm-
versions, while often protesting against the "fetter" of
them. But at his best he wielded them with an altogether
new grace and dignity : and his hymns have a compact and
balanced structure which those of his predecessors lacked
and which was to be deliberately aimed at as a prime
requisite of good hymn-writing by his successors.
M 167

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

In view of Watts's pre-eminent position in English
hymnody it is desirable to give here a brief account of his
life. 261 He was born in 1674, the son of a Nonconformist
schoolmaster who had twice suffered imprisonment for his
religious convictions. Being a brilliantly clever boy, he
was offered the chance of education at one of the Universi-
ties with a view to ordination to the Anglican ministry.
But he preferred to enter one of the rising Nonconformist
Academies situated at Stoke Newington. On leaving this
at the age of twenty he spent two years at home : and it
was then that he wrote many of the pieces contained in his
first collection of hymns, Hymns and Spiritual Songs, though
this was not published till 1707, with a second and en-
larged edition in 1709. It is necessary to lay stress on this :
for the name "Dr. Watts" suggests to most of us a vener-
able and rather grim divine, not a young enthusiast
with giants of conventional routine and prejudice to fight.
Dr. Dearmer well speaks of his "magnificent youthful
aggression". 262 The next six years he spent in tutoring the
son of a Nonconformist knight and in studying with an
ardour for which he was to pay heavily in the sequel. In
1702 he was ordained pastor of the important Indepen-
dent congregation in Mark Lane : but at the end of a year
his health failed and an assistant pastor had to be pro-
vided, who after another severe illness of Watts in 1712
was appointed co-pastor. For the rest of his life Watts was
the guest of Sir Thomas Abney and later of his widow.
He received the degree of D.D. from the University of
Edinburgh in 1728. Twenty years later his suffering life
came to an end.

Watts's hymns number about 600 in all. Besides the
collection already mentioned he published Home Lyricae
(1706-9), in which hymns were mingled among the
poems ; Divine and Moral Songs for the Use of Children (1715) ;
and The Psalms of David (1719) the last containing not
translations of the psalms in the strict sense, but rather

1 68

ENGLISH HYMNODY UP TO TIME OF WATTS

poems based upon them. From this collection is taken
Watts's finest and most famous hymn, 'O GOD, our help
in ages past' *i65 f450 +598 based on ps. xc. Watts's
own version began 'Our GOD . . . ' : but this was altered by
John Wesley in his collection of 1737 to its present form.
In the current version the original 9 stanzas are reduced
to 6. The story is told that Jowett once asked a number of
Oxford dons to jot down a small list of the best hymns.
All returned with only one hymn, 'O GOD, our help',
which each regarded as fulfilling all the requisites of a per-
fect hymn. 263 Of it Mr. F. J. Gillman has said with truth
that it "has become the great ceremonial hymn of the
English nation, and if nothing else had come from
his pen it justifies its author's memorial in Westminster

Another of Watts's hymns is only less celebrated, and
breathes a spiritual ardour that 'O GOD, our help' neces-
sarily lacks the splendid Passion hymn, first of all
English hymns on that subject, 'When I survey the won-
drous Cross' *io8 1 107 133, which originally appeared
in the 1707 collection. To these masterpieces may be
added several more hymns in well-nigh universal use
which give further proof of the extent to which the genius
of Watts has enriched the hymnody of the English-speaking
race : 'How bright those glorious spirits shine' *438
f 199 207, 'Give me the wings of faith to rise' *6a3 f 197
204, 'Gome, let us join our cheerful songs' *2gg t37^
472, 'Jesus shall reign where'er the sun' *220 f420 +545,
'This is the day the Lord hath made' *478 23 and 'There
is a land of pure delight' *536 ^498 201. Tradition says
that the last-named came upon him one summer day,
while he was gazing across Southampton Water ; and the
pleasant meadows near Netley are said to have suggested
the phrase, "Sweet fields beyond the swelling flood". 265
Other hymns that are less well known are 'Awake, our
souls ! away, our fears' *682 451 and 'Christ hath a garden

169

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

walled around' 245. Robert Bridges's fine hymn, 'My
Lord, my Life, my Love' 1442 +584, is based on an
original by Watts.

Of those who followed in the trail blazed by Watts the
most important name is that of one of his friends, another
eminent Nonconformist divine, Dr. Philip Doddridge
(1702-51). Like Watts he was offered the chance of being
educated for ordination in the Church of England, but
preferred to become a Nonconformist minister. He held
various charges in the Midlands and died of consumption
at Lisbon at the age of 49. His hymns were published by
his friend Job Ortpn in 1755 after his death. The best
known are the following : 'Hark, the glad sound' *47 |6
62, 'Ye servants of the Lord' *s68 1518^702, 'My GOD,
and is Thy table spread' *3i7 1320 and 'O GOD of
Bethel 5 1447 +596. The last was published by Orton with
the variant first line adopted in A.M., 'O GOD of Jacob'
*5i2. The current form of it is a drastic recast by a
Scotsman called Logan (1781). It became immensely
popular in Scotland, where "it holds a place in the
affeclion of all Scotsmen second only to 'The Lord's my
Shepherd'". 266 Of hymns for national occasions it and
'O GOD, our help' easily stand first.

170

CHAPTER VIII

THE METHODIST AND EVANGELICAL
MOVEMENTS

IN a letter written to a correspondent at Truro in
1757 John Wesley made a comparison between the
worship of the Established Church and that of the
young Methodist societies, very much to the advantage of
the latter. Having commented on the superior reverence
in their case of both congregation and officiant he went on
as follows :

Nor are their solemn addresses to GOD interrupted either by
the formal drawl of a parish clerk, the screaming of boys who
bawl out what they neither feel or understand, or the un-
reasonable and unmeaning impertinence of a voluntary on the
organ. When it is seasonable to sing praise to GOD they do it
with the spirit and with the understanding also ; not in the
miserable, scandalous doggerel of Hopkins and Sternhold, but
in psalms and hymns which are both sense and poetry, such as
would sooner dispose a critic to turn Christian than a Christian
to turn critic. What they sing is therefore a proper continua-
tion of the spiritual and reasonable service ; being seleded for
that end, not by a poor humdrum wretch who can scarce read
what he drones out with such an air of importance, but by one
who knows what he is about and how to connect the preceding
with the following part of the service. Nor does he take just
"two staves", but more or less, as may best raise the soul to
GOD ; especially when sung in well-composed and well-
adapted tunes, not by an handful of unawakened striplings,
but by a whole serious congregation ; and these not lolling at
ease, or in the indecent posture of sitting, drawling out one
word after another, but all standing before GOD and praising
Him lustily and with a good courage. 267

The animus in all this can hardly be disputed : Wesley
is certainly making the worst of what he criticizes. Yet it is

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a simple historical fad that an enormous part of the
attraction of the movement that he created and led con-
sisted in the warmer and more enthusiastic conception of
worship for which it stood, and especially in the free,
heartfelt participation of the whole congregation in that
worship by means of a new, intimately personal type of
hymnody. In the days when the old metrical psalmody
was new, it, too, had been an intensely popular and
personal thing indeed these psalms had been the war-
songs of the rebel army in its fight against Rome. But, like
the Office Hymns of an earlier day, they had in course of
time lost their power to stir men's hearts and had become
for most people nothing but a humdrum part of the litur-
gical routine. As against their monopoly Watts had suc-
cessfully vindicated the claim of hymns to be a part of
congregational worship. But his success had been won
outside the National Church : and even so the movement .
inaugurated by him was "purely liturgical, a sober and
deliberate undertaking for the 'Renovation of psalmody'
in the ordinary worship of the Church". 268 The revivalist
methods of Wesley and his associates called for some-
thing different. What was wanted was a hymnody that
would refled the new kind of preaching initiated by them
a preaching that meant, not the reading from the pulpit
of an elaborately phrased and long-winded dissertation on
morality or attentuated dodrine, but a bold impromptu
appeal to each man's heart and conscience couched in
popular language. The feelings aroused by the preacher
must be given an outlet on the lips of his hearers in accord-
ance with the principle that modern educationalists sum
up in the phrase, "Expression must follow impression".
When men's hearts are full their emotions clamour for
utterance in speech and song : and it was to their recog-
nition of this simple psychological fad that a great part
of the success of the pioneers of Methodism was due.
The need of a new type of hymnody framed on such

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

lines would no doubt have led in any case to attempts to
supply it. But by a superb stroke of good fortune the prime
leaders of the movement themselves were able and ready
to show the way. A comparison has often been made be-
tween John Wesley and General Booth : but while both
were great preachers and great organizers, Wesley, unlike
Booth, was a sacred poet as well. And his brother and
constant associate, Charles Wesley, ranks with Isaac
Watts as one of the two greatest names in English
hymnody. A taste for writing religious poetry seems indeed
to have been a hereditary trait in the Wesley family. The
father of John and Charles, Samuel Wesley, Reclor of
Epworth, Lines., wrote a number of poems, including a
Heroic Poem on the life of our Lord that was much admired
in its day. His eldest son, Samuel Wesley the younger,
wrote along with other religious verses a number of hymns
that still survive in Wesleyan hynln-books : one of them
appears, too, in AM. *5io. His daughter Mehetabel (the
"Hetty Wesley" of Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch's novel) was
a poetess of talent, though she wrote no hymns. It is, how-
ever, upon the achievement of the second and the
youngest sons of the elder Samuel, John and Charles, that
the fame of the family rests, in hymnody as in other
directions. 269

From start to finish the two brothers were united by the
closest bond of affection and also by a profound com-
munity of ideas, aims and work ; even though towards the
end of his life Charles, always a staunch Church of
England man, viewed with grave misgivings his brother's
tendency to encourage the schismatic tendencies which,
after the death of both, were to cut Methodism away alto-
gether from the Church that had given it birth. John was
born in 1703, Charles in 1707 ; the former being educated
at Charterhouse, the latter at Westminster. John went up
to Christ Church, Oxford, in 1720, and six years after was
elected Fellow of Lincoln. In the same year, 172 6, Charles,

173

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

too, went to Christ Church, where he later became a
Tutor. At Oxford (whither John returned in 1729 after
serving for a time as his father's curate at Epworth) the
two brothers became the leading figures in a small group
of devout members of the University nicknamed "Method-
ists" on account of their strictly disciplined life and zeal
in observing the fast days and frequenting the sacraments
of the Church. Other opprobrious names for them were
"Sacramentarians", "Bible-bigots" and "The Holy
Club". To the same group belonged James Hervey,
author of the once celebrated Meditations among the Tombs,
and another figure hardly less significant than the
Wesleys themselves, George Whitefield, destined to be
closely associated with them in the earliest phase of
Methodism. Whitefield, the son of an innkeeper at
Gloucester, went up to Oxford in 1732 as servitor of Pem-
broke : he was thus the junior of the Wesleys in age and
standing.

In 1735 John Wesley received an invitation to evangel-
ize the settlers and the Indians in the newly planted
American colony of Georgia. After some hesitation he
accepted, and Charles decided to accompany him. On
their voyage out they were much impressed by the piety
of some German Moravians who were their fellow-
passengers. One result of this contact was to confirm the
brothers in an already pronounced taste for the singing of
hymns. On arriving in America they introduced the prac-
tice to the congregations to which they ministered, not
without exciting opposition: and in 1737 John Wesley,
described as "Missioner of Georgia", published at Charles-
town a Collection of Psalms and Hymns. This book, like the
Divine Companion, included in its 70 items adaptations
from Herbert, Austin and Addison ; half of its contents
were by Watts ; while the remainder consisted of 5 hymns
by each of the two Samuel Wesleys (Charles was not a
contributor) and 5 translations from the German by John

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

Wesley himself, who had recently been a diligent student
of German pietistic hymnody. Much of the book was re-
produced in a volume with the same title which John
published on his return to England in 1738.

This return was accompanied by a deep discouragement
at the scant success of his labours, which he was inclined
to attribute to the facl that he himself was not yet con-
verted. He consorted closely once more with the Mora-
vians and their leader, Peter Bohler. On May 24, 1738, he
went to a meeting in Aldersgate Street, at which someone
was reading Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans.
His Journal narrates the experience which followed :

About a quarter before nine, while he was describing the
change which GOD works in the heart through faith in Christ,
I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ,
Christ alone for salvation ; and an assurance was given me that
He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from
the law of sin and death. 270

Henceforth, he believed, his conversion was an accom-
plished facl : and for him this could only mean the call to
a lifelong task of helping others to share the blessings of
which he himself was so richly conscious. The following
month he paid a visit to the headquarters of the Moravians
at Herrnhut, where he met their patron, Count Zinzen-
dorf, and had further opportunity of becoming acquainted
with their hymnody. On Aug. i, he records,

About eight we went to the public service, at which they
frequently use other instruments with their organ. They began
(as usual) with singing. Then followed the expounding, closed
by a second hymn. Prayer followed this ; and then a few
verses of a third hymn, which concluded the service. 271

The effecl: of this was still further to increase his en-
thusiasm for hymn-singing of the emotional type affecled
by the Moravians.

Returning to England in September, "I began again,"
he says, "to declare in my own country the glad tidings of

175

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

salvation". 272 His brother, who had himself experienced
conversion a short while before, associated himself with
his labours. Soon, following the example already set by
Whitefield, John began that practice of "field-preaching"
which he was to pursue with such enormous success for
the rest of his long life, travelling immense distances over
the length and breadth of England, His converts were
organized into bands or societies on the model of the
Moravians : and, after Wesley had parted company with
the latter on account of the alleged Antinomian tendencies
that they had developed, he formed his own societies into
a separate organization, with its headquarters at a disused
foundry in Moorfields, which he converted into the first
Methodist meeting-house in London (1739).

With the further development of Methodism we need
not concern ourselves here apart from its bearing on
English hymnody. "The English Hymn," (to quote Dr.
Louis Benson's apt remark), "that had found so capable a
tutor as Watts, had been waiting for so devoted a
lover as Wesley." 273 To the practice of hymn-singing
John Wesley, like Luther, attached the utmost import-
ance, not only for its value in exciting and voicing religious
emotion but also as a means of instruction and edification.
The Methodist hymns were to be "a body of experimental
and practical divinity". In his preface to the Wesley an
Hymn-book of 1780 Wesley asks :

In what other publication have you so distinct and full an
account of Scriptural Christianity : such a declaration of the
heights and depths of religion, speculative and practical : so
strong cautions against the most plausible errors, particularly
those now most prevalent : and so clear directions for making
your calling .and eledion sure; for perfecting holiness in. the
fear of GOD ?

He himself was continually active in providing what
was needed. It is a mistake to separate off the two brothers
into John the preacher and Charles the hymn-writer.

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

Both were preachers, both were hymn-writers ; though the
one was more gifted in the first direction, the other in the
second. And, despite his inferior poetic endowment, it was
John, not Charles, who took the lead in hymnody, as in
everything else. His was the brain that planned the
Methodist hymnody, gave it its shape, made provision for
and encouraged its use and recalled it to more sober paths
when it degenerated into extravagance. In the hymnal
publications which bear the name of the two brothers it
is impossible to say which of them was the author of a
particular hymn. The common view assigns to John all
those hymns that are translated from the German (a
language unknown to Charles) and to Charles all the
original hymns. But a conviction is growing that John's
share in the latter was considerably greater than has been
commonly supposed. 274

The first collection of hymns published jointly by the
brothers appeared in 1739 with the title Hymns and Sacred
Poems. Published by John and Charles Wesley. This contained
the earliest versions of the two hymns which, having under-
gone not a few alterations, have emerged as 'Hark ! the
herald angels sing' *6o f24 74 (originally 'Hark, how all
the welkin rings') and 'Hail the day that sees Him rise'
*I47 fi43 1 1 72. An entirely new book with the same
title was issued in 1740; its contents including, 'Jesu,
Lover of my soul' *ig3 1414 1542, 'O for a thousand
tongues to sing' *522 t44 +595 an d 'Christ, Whose glory
fills the skies' *7 1258 26. Next year came a Collection of
Psalms and Hymns, and in 1742 still another volume of
Hymns and Sacred Poems. In the latter year, too, appeared
the first Methodist tune-book with the title A Collection of
Tunes Set to music as they are commonly sung at the Foundery.
This contained over 40 tunes intended to supplement the
psalm-tunes already in use. From this "Foundery Collec-
tion" comes the well-known tune 'Savannah' (or 'Herrn-
hut') fi35 160. Another book with tunes followed in

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

1746 entitled Hymns on the Great Festivals and Other Occasions,
and containing 24 hymns written by Charles Wesley,
along with the same number of tunes by a German
bassoon-player called Lampe, a friend of a convert of
John's. (The tune 'Devonshire' *682='Kent 5 +524, is
from this book : its solid simplicity is in wholesome con-
trast to Lampe's usually over-florid style, of which 'Dying
Stephen' *6y4 is a mild specimen.) This collection was in
turn followed in 1753 by a volume issued by Thomas
Butts, a friend of the Wesleys, and called Harmonia Sacra,
containing, together with the tunes, words written by the
Wesleys and others.

Meanwhile various new collections of words had made
their appearance, of which one, Hymns on the Lord's Supper,
issued in 1 745, deserves special mention, alike on literary
grounds and for its careful and profound theology. From
this come the 7 Eucharistic hymns in AM. : 'Author of
life divine' *3iQ f303 +263, 'O Thou, before the world
began' *554, 'Victim Divine' *556 J333, 'Saviour, and can
it be' *7i8, 'With solemn faith we offer up' *72O, 'How
glorious is the life above' *723 and the exultant 'Hosanna
in the highest' *724 ; the last of which, in particular, as set
to Dr. S. H. Nicholson's fine tune, deserves to be far better
known than it is. A collection of 1 744 contains 'Rejoice !
The Lord is King' *202 f4?6 +632, for which Handel
wrote his grand tune 'GopsaP : and another of 1 747 the
beautiful 'Love Divine, all loves excelling' *520 1437
573, not less worthily set by Stanford in our own day.
On his marriage in 1 749 Charles Wesley raised the money
required for furnishing his house by issuing his unpub-
lished compositions in two volumes and selling them by
subscription through the Methodist preachers. It is grati-
fying to add that the proceeds were fully adequate for the
purpose in view.

A further collection of 1758 contained the Advent
hymn, 'Lo ! He comes with clouds descending' *5i f 7

178

METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

. The history of this hymn is almost as complicated as
its fame is great. 276 The genesis of it is due to one of
Wesley's early associates, John Cennick (see below, p. 185),
who published in 1752 a hymn beginning :

Lo ! He cometh, countless trumpets
Blow before His bloody sign. . . .

It won the notice of Charles Wesley, who appears to have
been at the same time attracted by its ideas and form and
repelled by Gennick's rather revolting manipulation of
them. He therefore remodelled it, reducing the original
6 stanzas to 4. In 1760 Martin Madan (of whom later)
combined these 4 stanzas with 2 of Cennick's to produce
a cento which has been in wide use in English-speaking
countries. The form of the hymn, however, as given in
A.M., E.H. and S.P. omits the Cennick verses and repro-
duces Wesley's version in a slightly altered form. The
famous tune, 'Helmsley', which has become inextricably
associated with it, is attributed to the early Wesleyan
preacher, Thomas Olivers, who apparently adapted it
from a song by the Irish composer, Charles Thomas
Carter, 'Gracious angels, now protect me', which enjoyed
great vogue at the period. 276

The collection of 1758 was followed in 1759 by three
more, including a set of Funeral Hymns, one of which,
'Come let us join our friends above', is the source from
which after many cuts and changes is derived 'Let saints
on earth in concert sing' *22i t4 2 ^ +557* By this time the
total number of hymns sponsored by the Wesleys had
reached such proportions that it was felt that the time
was come to submit them to a process of selection.
Further, John Wesley was not wholly satisfied with the
tunes in use, erring as they did more and more on the
florid side as time went on, and desired to have a collection
of them authorized by himself. In 1761, therefore, he pub-
lished a volume of Select Hymns for the use of Christians of all

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Denominations, for which was provided a selection of Tunes
Annext. With these appeared Wesley's "Directions for
Singing", containing seven rules, which are as follows :

Learn these tunes before any others ; sing them exactly as
printed ; sing all of them ; sing lustily ; sing modestly ; sing in
tune ; above all sing spiritually, with an eye to GOD in every
word.

Several editions of this book were issued at intervals.
Concerning them Dr. Frere remarks : "In these volumes
it is possible to trace the development of Methodist
hymn-singing as the Wesleys wished it to be. About one-
third of the tunes and compositions in Butts's Harmonia
Sacra find no place here : on the whole it is the more solid
and congregational melodies that are included. Wesley,
as a musician and revivalist, seems to have used his in-
fluence to exclude the worst of the bad specimens of
hymnody which were everywhere in growing favour. But
even so some of the things that remain are surprising." 277
Meanwhile Charles Wesley's torrential spate of sacred
song continued unabated. In 1762 he published two
volumes of Short Hymns on SeMed Passages of Holy Scripture,
containing the staggering total of 2030 new compositions !
Hymns for Children appeared in 1763, including 'Gentle
Jesus, meek and mild' fsgi 356 : and a number of other
collections were still to come. It was only in the last years
of his long life that the source began to dry up. He died in
1788 with the words on his lips : "I have lived, and I die,
in the Communion of the Church of England." A fort-
night after his death John Wesley gave out before preach-
ing his brother's hymn, 'Come, O Thou Traveller un-
known' *774 f378 +476, first published in the 1742 collec-
tion and deemed by many the finest thing he ever wrote,
though its almost agonized note of spiritual passion makes
it unsuitable for common use. When he reached the
words, "My company before is gone, And I am left alone
with Thee," the old man burst into tears and covered his

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face with his hands, while the congregation wept too. 278
Less than three years later (on March 2, 1792) he himself
passed to fresh fields of service (the word 'rest' is unthink-
able in connection with John Wesley), at the great age of
87. Like many other great men (and even great saints) he
was not always easy to get on with. But in spiritual ardour
and zeal for souls he has had few equals in the Christian
centuries : and it is hardly possible to exaggerate the work
he did for the toiling and neglected masses of his time in
an age when the so-called National Church had largely
gone to sleep. Indeed, it has been maintained that he
more than any other individual man saved England from
sharing the horrors and excesses of the French Revolu-
tion, by turning the aspirations of the common people to
spiritual rather than temporal satisfactions. Nor, one may
believe, would he have been unwilling to admit that the
sweet serenity of his beloved inseparable Charles displayed
an aspect of Christian holiness which his own fiery auto-
cratic nature was unable to achieve.

Concerning the hymns written by the Wesleys it is no
exaggeration to say that for a long time they occupied the
whole field of Methodist hymnody to the virtual exclusion
of anything else. Of their Methodist contemporaries only
two made any mark Thomas Olivers (1725-99) and
John Bakewell ; while in the generation following there
were practically no Methodist hymn-writers at all. It was
Olivers who wrote the stately hymn 'The GOD of Abraham
praise' *6oi 1646 $398, based on the Hebrew 'Yigdal'.
The tune, a "synagogue melody" supplied to the poet
by the Jewish singer Leoni (Lyons), has a suspicious like-
ness to a song 'Why, soldiers, why' sung at the Haymarket
Theatre in I729- 279

The indisputable contributions of John Wesley to our
Anglican hymn-books are not many: but they well
deserve their place. All are translations from the German,
and have been already spoken of in an earlier chapter in

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connexion with their originals. Two are taken from
Gerald Tersteegen, 'Lo ! GOD is here' *526 1637 +191,
and Thou hidden love of GOD' *6oo 671 ; one (the best
of all) from Paul Gerhardt, Tut thou thy trust in GOD'
*6g2 (S.P. supplies an alternative cento, 'Commit thou
all thy griefs' $479) . The Communion hymn, 'Author of
life divine' *3ig 1303 $263, is sometimes attributed to
John: but in the collection of 1745 in which it first
appeared the authorship is not stated and it is more likely
to be his brother's.

The contribution of Charles is much more extensive :
and it is one of the chief merits of A.M. that it gives him
such copious and admirable representation. The great
bulk of his hymns have of course sunk beneath the stream
of time beyond possibility of rescue. It is estimated that
his compositions totalled 6500 in all an appalling
thought. Obviously he could hardly have spent much
time in polishing them up nor would he himself have
thought it necessary or even desirable to do so, for they
were written to serve the turn of an aftive and incessant
evangelism and also to relieve his own glowing heart.
Many were probably written in order to drive home a
particular sermon. But, as Dr. Dearmer has justly ob-
served, "his masterpieces would have been more if he had
had more of the craftsman's conscience": 280 and even
those of his hymns that have won a perennial fame have
often needed a good deal of emendation before they could
fully deserve it. He himself deprecated any tampering
with his work. In the preface to the 1 780 Collection he gives
leave to all to print his hymns "provided they print them
as they are. But I desire they would not attempt to mend
them, for they really are not able". 281 His editors, how-
ever, have judged otherwise : and no doubt they are right.
But his incredible abundance has at least had the advan-
tage of providing a wider range of selection for time and
taste to ply their winnowing-fan upon. After all, with

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

Wesley as with Watts (and with far greater poets than
either for that matter) it signifies little to posterity how
much chaff they produced so long as the good grain is
there. And who shall deny that the man who wrote the
hymns of which mention has been made in this chapter
was anything less than one of the greatest hymn- writers of
all time ? Some have even called him the greatest of all.
Of many of his hymns the ardent personal emotion is not
for all tastes, nor perhaps in any case for all congregations
or all occasions. In the ears of an undogmatic age their
unashamed accent of evangelical Christianity may even
sound tiresome and out-of-date. Yet none the less the
religion they express has the authentic note of the Gospels
and Epistles of the New Testament in which their author
was saturated : and if ever the glow of the early Methodism
comes back to the English-speaking world, men will find
no hymns more fitted to express it than the best of what
Charles Wesley has bequeathed to them.

ii

We have seen how at the very outset of his evangelistic
career Wesley felt compelled to sever himself from his
spiritual parents, the Moravians. Not long after (c. 1740)
the abysmal issue of Predestination and Freewill clove a
gulf between him and his most gifted co-operator White-
field. Wesley declared for the Arminian view of the opera-
tion of Divine grace, Whitefield for the Calvinist. The
personal difference was soon healed : but henceforth the
ways of the two friends lay apart. As a preacher White-
field was perhaps even more remarkable than Wesley : but
he possessed none of the latter's gifts of leadership and
organizing power. However, his association with that
masterful exemplar of high-born feminine piety, Selina,
Countess of Huntingdon, helped considerably to make up
for his own deficiency in these respects. He himself made
no attempt to found a new denomination : and the

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

societies that he formed did not last long. The Countess's
work was to be more enduring. Her original intention was
not to break with the Church of England but to uplift it.
With this object she built proprietary chapels and
appointed clergymen as her chaplains to officiate in them.
But opposition to the opening of a new chapel in Spa
Fields in 1779 compelled her to register her chapels as
dissenting conventicles : and a new denomination thus
came into existence called "The Countess of Huntingdon's
Connexion". Meanwhile Wesley steadily pursued his own
path, which in spite of his repeated professions of devotion
to the Church of England led him further and further
away from her. Yet even the torpid National Church
could not remain wholly unaffected by the religious
impetus that he had set in motion, however much its
prelates might frown upon "enthusiasm" and many of
the parochial clergy resent the incursions of Wesley and
his preachers upon their preserves. The Evangelical move-
ment in the Church of England was just as much Wesley's
child as the Methodism that bears his name ; even though
on the doctrinal side it preferred the Calvinism of White-
field and Lady Huntingdon to the Arminianism of Wesley
himself.

Each of these movements, Moravian, Huntingdonian
and Evangelical, was to develop its own hymnody. Out-
side the charmed circle of Methodism itself the character-
istic hymnody of the Wesleys had little popularity or
currency for a long time. Its unusual metres, its theology,
its emotionalism and spiritual elevation, were alike un-
congenial. The great name was still Dr. Watts, who (as
Dr. Benson says) "embodied the theology of his surround-
ings, and kept well within the average range of spiritual
experience". 282

i. The one exception to this sober preference was fur-
nished by the Moravians. Their hymnody was not less
emotional than the Methodist, but more so. In facl its

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extravagant and often repulsive imagery so shocked John
Wesley that he repudiated it and even held it up to public
obloquy. The earlier Moravian hymns were for the most
part translated from those of the German Pietistic school :
and their bizarre foreignness was increased by the clumsi-
ness and illiteracy of the versions. Later on, however, the
Moravian hymnody sobered down, and its produces were
drastically pruned and remodelled. 283 Of English hymn-
writers two belonged to the Moravian persuasion : John
Cennick (1718-55) and James Montgomery (1771-1854).
The former, however, was but slightly represented in the
first Moravian books : and his earlier hymns were written
in the days of his association with Wesley and (after 1740)
with Whitefield, before he finally joined the Moravians in
1745. Of his hymns only one is well known, 'Children of
the heavenly King' *547 1373 1463. His part in the evolu-
tion of 'Lo ! He comes' has already been spoken of.
Montgomery belongs to a considerably later period : and
his catholic connections, and particularly his association
with the Evangelical Cotterill (concerning which more
will be said later), give him a far more than sectarian sig-
nificance. The son of a Moravian minister, he became a
journalist, and in 1796 editor of the Sheffield Reporter. Twice
in the next two years he suffered imprisonment for his
advanced Liberal opinions : but he lived to receive a
royal pension in 1833. A list of his best-known hymns will
suffice to indicate the debt of posterity to his poetic gift :
'Hail to the Lord's Anointed' *2ig J45 87, 'For ever
with the Lord' *23i tsgi 195, 'Angels, from the realms
of glory' *482 $71, 'Stand up and bless the Lord' *7o6,
'Songs of praise the angels sang' *2g7 f48i 644, 'Palms
of glory' *445 t 20I > an ^ the two fine missionary hymns
(Montgomery was an enthusiast for foreign missions), 'O
Spirit of the living GOD' *585 and 'Lift up your heads, ye
gates of brass' *586 1549.

ii. In the evolution of the hymnody of the Countess of

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Huntingdon's Connexion the "noble and elect lady" (as
her votaries styled her) played the leading part, as we
might expect. She is even said by tradition to have been a
hymn- writer herself: but there is no satisfactory evidence
of this. After various experiments a definitive hymn-book
for the use of the whole Connexion was issued in 1 780,
Lady Huntingdon herself made the selection, with the
assistance of her cousin, the Honourable and Reverend
Walter Shirley (1725-86). The book had a pronounced
Calvinist flavour, and held its place till 1854. Three names
represented in Anglican hymnals belonged to the
Huntingdon entourage. One was Shirley himself., who
besides hymns of his own was responsible for the popular
Good Friday hymn, 'Sweet the moments rich in blessing'
*iog f 105. This was a very drastic recast of an earlier
hymn that appeared in 1757 in an "Inghamite" collection
usually known as the Kendal Hymn Book. Still more famous
is 'All hail, the power of Jesus' name' *3oo 1364 440,
the writer of which, Edward Perronet (? 1726-92), offici-
ated at Canterbury as one of her ladyship's "ministers"
until he quarrelled with her. The third name is Thomas
Haweis (1734-1820), author of the hymn C O Thou from
Whom all goodness flows' *283 |85 $117, and also of the
fine tune to which it was originally set, known as 'Rich-
mond' *i72 ii |375 $468.

iii. The permanent contribution to hymnody of the
Evangelical movement within the Church of England is
far more important than that of any other outcome of
Wesley's initial impulse except Methodism itself, with
which it may fairly challenge comparison in this respect.
The first of the Evangelical leaders, William Romaine,
was indeed an irreconcilable opponent of the practice of
hymn-singing and adhered to Calvin's principle of "The
Bible and the Bible only" in Church song. But even in
attacking the new Hymnody he was compelled to bear an
unwilling testimony to its success. "The singing of the

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

psalms," he wrote in 1775, "is now almost as despicable
among the modern religions as it was some time ago
among the prophane." 284 He is, of course, speaking of
Evangelical circles only : elsewhere the old Psalmody still
reigned more or less supreme. The opposite view to
Romaine's was championed by Martin Madan, a clergy-
man who had founded with the assistance of his friends
the Lock Hospital, near Hyde Park Corner, where he
officiated as chaplain and won considerable repute as a
preacher. For its use he published in 1760 a Collection of
Psalms and Hymns (usually called the "Lock Hospital
Collection") to which reference has already been made.
Other collections from various hands followed Madan's, of
which that issued by Richard Gonyers (1767) is worthy of
mention in that in its second edition (1772) Gowper's two
famous hymns, 'There is a fountain filled with blood' and
'O for a closer walk with GOD', first saw the light. More
important, however, than any of these is Psalms and Hymns
for Public and Private worship ', put forth in 1776 by Augustus
Toplady (1740-78). Toplady was a consumptive graduate
of Dublin University who became Vicar of Broadhem-
bury in Devon. He was a popular preacher and withal a
fanatical Galvinist. From this standpoint he made
sustained and bitter attacks on John Wesley, who held
his tongue on the ground that he "did not fight with
chimney-sweeps". Toplady's controversial fury, however,
reveals only the less attractive side of an odd and un-
balanced character that had many compensating quali-
ties. In his collection he included a number of Charles
Wesley's hymns, but emended from his own Calvinist
standpoint. It also contained six hymns by himself, one of
them the celebrated 'Rock of ages, cleft for me' *i84 J477
$636. It has been frequently criticized, and is perhaps
hardly as popular to-day as it was : but it has an intense
and profoundly moving quality that is all its own. It was
a great favourite of the High Churchman Gladstone, and

187

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

was sung at his funeral. The form in which it is familiar is
the author's own, apart from a well-justified alteration of
the line 'When my eye-strings break in death'. It may be
added that the story that Toplady wrote it when shelter-
ing from a storm in a cleft rock in the Mendips is without
any foundation in fad. 285

Three years after Toplady's collection, in 1779, appeared
the most remarkable product of the Evangelical move-
ment in the sphere of hymnody, the book which may be
said to have definitely fixed the type of the "Evangelical"
hymn. This was the volume entitled Olney Hymns, Z86
arranged in three books and containing 280 hymns by
John Newton (1725-1807), Vicar of Olney, Bucks, and
68 by his friend, the poet William Cowper (1731-1800).
The project was begun at the latter's suggestion and was
undertaken (as Newton informs us in his preface) partly
from "a desire of promoting the faith and comfort of
sincere Christians", partly "as a monument, to perpetuate
the remembrance of an intimate and endeared friend-
ship". But it had not proceeded far when Gowper was
stricken with mental breakdown (1773) ; and Newton had
to complete it by himself. To prevent misapprehension he
appended the letter G to his friend's hymns in the pub-
lished volume.

The close friendship of Newton and Gowper is a striking
proof of the power of a common religious interest to unite
men as widely sundered as possible in temperament and
in life-history. John Newton, like many of Wesley's early
preachers (including Olivers), was a "brand plucked from
the burning". Whether either he or they were quite as bad
in their unregenerate days as they afterwards believed is
perhaps open to doubt: but Newton's early life was at
least sufficiently adventurous. He went to sea at the age of
eleven, was flogged as a deserter from the Navy and for
fifteen months was servant to a slave-dealer in Africa. The
one anchor of his existence in these years was his love for

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

his future wife, Mary Gatlett. His conversion was begun
by a chance reading of Thomas a Kempis and sealed by the
experiences of a terrible night at sea. For six years he was
the pious captain of a slave-ship. After nine more years,
during which he consorted with Wesley and Whitefield
and struggled hard to make good his lack of education,
he was ordained as curate of Olney (1764). It was here
that he formed his friendship with Cowper, who assisted
him as a sort of unpaid lay curate. He left Olney in 1780
to be Rector of St. Mary Woolnoth in the city of London,
where he became a notable pillar of Evangelicalism and
remained till his death.

The tragic story of Cowper' s life is too well known to
need retelling in these pages. It was as lacking in external
incident as Newton's was the reverse. The interest of it lies
partly in its revelation of a character as gentle and
humorous as it was exquisitely gifted, partly in the appal-
ling religious melancholia which overshadowed by far the
greater part of it and issued three times in definite bouts
of insanity, from the last of which he never emerged. It
was after his recovery from the first of these attacks that
he formed his friendship with his guardian-angel, Mrs.
Unwin ("My Mary"), in whose home he lived, first at
Huntingdon and then from 1768 to 1786 at Olney.
Opinions vary as to the effect of Newton's influence on
the poet. Perhaps the truth is fairly accurately summed up
by Sir Leslie Stephen: "The friendship was durable.
Newton, if stern, was a man of sense and feeling. It seems
probable, however, that he was insufficiently alive to the
danger of exciting Cowper's nerves." 287 The "old
African blasphemer" (as Newton called himself in later
years) was hardly an ideal companion for one of Cowper's
sensitive, shrinking temperament : and his fiery emotional
type of religion cannot have had a precisely soothing
effect. It seems undeniable that when Newton left Olney
Cowper's health improved and his spirits became more

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

equable. On the other hand, it is most unfair to regard
Cowper's madness as due to religion. His belief that he
was a lost soul was the efFed of his insanity, not vice versa.
Indeed, so long as he was not pressed too hard, his religion
seems to have been the ultimate source of whatever inward
peace and happiness he ever knew. 288

Remembering the fierce furnace of spiritual experience
through which in their different ways the two friends were
called to pass, we shall scarcely be surprised at the
emotionalism that characterizes their hymns. The inspira-
tion of both was essentially autobiographical : and this is
always perilous in a hymn-writer. It is hard to say how far
the Olney Hymns were designed for congregational use as a
whole. Many of them are indubitably quite unsuited for
the purpose, voicing as they do a kind of religious experi-
ence to which the average worshipper is a stranger. But
the contents of the book were quickly laid hold of by
hymnal-compilers : and many of its hymns achieved great
popularity in all denominations. The effecl: of this was by
no means wholly beneficial, encouraging as it did that
tendency to force emotion and to invite to self-deception
in regard to it which is the great danger of Revivalist
religion. But not all the Olney Hymns are tarred with this
brush : and their excessively gloomy view of man's fallen
nature is normally offset by an exultant sense of his escape
from it into the paths of salvation. Those of them that have
survived in common use are for the most part remarkably
free from the morbidity that we usually associate with
Evangelical hymnody. Of Newton's we may mention :
'Glorious things of thee are spoken 5 *545 J393 +5 >
'Great Shepherd of Thy people, hear' *6go ; 'How sweet
the name of Jesus sounds' *i76 f4O5 527; and 'Come,
my soul, thy suit prepare' *527 J377 +473 ', to which may
be added the gay, lilting spring-song, 'Kindly spring again
is here' 1287 %z. Cowper's hymns include the noble 'Goo
moves in a mysterious way' *373 1394 503 (a hymn that

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

has helped to save many a tried and tormented spirit from
the poet's own despair) and the lovely 'O for a closer
walk with GOD' *630 1445 Ji 12, together with 'Hark, my
soul, it is the Lord' *s6o f40o 510, 'Jesus, where'er Thy
people meet' *52Q ^422 551 and 'There is a fountain
filled with blood' *633 1332 ; of which only the last has
"dated" through its use of the old-fashioned Evangelical
imagery.

m

With the appearance of the Olney Hymns the earlier type
of Evangelical hymn-book, arranged according to a
purely subjective classification and ignoring entirely the
Prayer Book scheme of worship, may be said to come to
an end. In the succeeding period there emerged a new
type of book, which sought "to adapt the new Hymnody
to the methods and manners of the Church". 289

The inspiration of these books was still Evangelical : but
their emergence was assisted by a slow yet steady change
that was taking place in the attitude of the National
Church at large in regard to hymn-singing. The change
was as yet far from universal. The more conservative still
clung manfully to their "Tate and Brady" and "Sternhold
and Hopkins". To do otherwise would be to bow the knee
to Dissent. When Dr. Johnson saw a girl attending the
Sacrament in a bedgown, "I gave her privately a crown,"
he says, "though I saw Hart's Hymns in her hand." 29
At the most it might be permissible to do what Bishop
Gibson suggested, 291 and arrange the metrical psalms in
such a way as to strike the keynote of the Church's times
and seasons as they came round. Others would tolerate
hymns on condition that they were not used in the liturgical
services. On the other hand, there was a growing inclina-
tion to allow their use even here, so long as it was done in
strict moderation and confined to the chief festivals. This
attitude showed itself in an increased readiness to use the
meagre collection of hymns provided in the Supplement to

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

the New Version. These hymns began to be printed in the
prayer-books along with the psalm-versions themselves :
and additions were even made to their number. It was in
this way that about 1816 the Easter hymn, 'Jesus Christ is
risen to-day' 292 *i34 ^133 $145 (of which both words
and music are first found in a little collection of 1708
framed on German models and called Lyra Davidicd)
began to be included by the side of the produces of Tate
and Brady.

To the new movement in favour of hymn-singing a
further impetus was given by the great popularity
accorded to the vocal performances of the inmates of
certain charitable institutions in London. In the later part
of the eighteenth century the polite world loved to parade
its "sensibility" : and it became the fashion to luxuriate in
the emotion excited by the singing of "Magdalens" and
"charity-children". For the institutions in question special
compositions were written and hymn-books compiled. We
have already mentioned Madan's collection of 1760, pre-
pared for the use of the Lock Hospital with its choir of
"female penitents". Similar collections were produced for
the Magdalen Hospital at Streatham and the House of
Refuge for Female Orphans near Westminster Bridge.
The organist of the latter, Thomas Riley, set his face
against the frivolous tunes of the Methodists, "which", he
said, "mostly consist of what they call Fuges, or (more
properly) Imitations, and are indeed fit to be sung only by
those who made them". 293 As a counterpoise he issued in
1762 a collection of tunes in the old solid style, in which
Dr. Samuel Howard's tune, 'St. Bride' *ioi 174 699 and
Gilding's 'St. Edmund' *395 ii fi7i 120 ii, first saw the
light. A later collection by Riley's successor included the
Frenchman Francois Barthelemon's 'Morning Hymn'
*3 ii J257 +25. To these must be added the Foundling
Hospital Collection, first issued in 1774, which contributed
(c. 1801) one well-known hymn to our hymn-books, 'Praise

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METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

the Lord, ye heavens adore Him' *2Q2 "["535 624. A
specimen of the sort of thing that the foundlings were
sometimes expected to sing may be quoted :

Obscured by mean and humble birth

In ignorance we lay,
Till Christian bounty call'd us forth

And led us into day. 294

In the parish churches, too, the children of the local
charity schools were formed into a sort of choir to lead the
singing. Once a year the "charity-children" of the metro-
polis, institutional and otherwise, were gathered together
for a united service, held latterly in St. Paul's Cathedral
and regarded as one of the sights of the town. The arrange-
ment lasted till 1877, by which time public interest in the
event no longer warranted the trouble and expense
involved in installing the staging, etc., required for it.

While the prejudice against hymns on the part of
Churchmen generally was thus dying down, the Evan-
gelical movement which championed them was on its side
ceasing to be a sort of ecclesiastical Ishmael, and was
coming into close contact with the main body of the
Church. It was no longer an affair of proprietary chapels
and isolated centres of influence, but was becoming a
definite party within the Establishment and was entrench-
ing itself firmly in the parochial system. Thus on both
sides, at the end of the eighteenth century, the time was
ripe for the first beginnings of a movement towards a
hymn-book that should be "the companion of the Book
of Common Prayer".

The credit of initiating this development belongs to an
Evangelical divine, the Reverend Basil Woodd (1760-
1831), who was preacher and later Incumbent of Bentinck
Chapel, Marylebone. 295 Woodd issued in 1794 a book
entitled The Psalms of David, and other portions of the Sacred
Scriptures, arranged according to the order of the Church of

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

England for every Sunday in the year ; also for the Saints' Days,
Holy Communion and other services. In this a metrical psalm
was indicated for each Sunday and Holy Day to serve as
an Introit, along with one or more hymns adapted to the
season or subjecl of the day. This seclion was followed by
hymns for Communion, Baptism, etc., and a few for
general use in worship.

During the next two or three decades numerous collec-
tions were published on more or less similar lines to
Woodd's. Of course the resulting growth of hymnody was
by no means welcomed everywhere. "The importance
which in many places attaches to the Hymn Book," com-
plained Bishop Marsh of Peterborough in a charge of
iSao, 296 "is equal if not superior to the importance
ascribed to the Prayer Book." Some bishops even pro-
hibited the use of hymns in their dioceses altogether. The
crisis came to a head when in 1819 Thomas Gotterill,
Vicar of St. Paul's, Sheffield, issued the eighth edition of
his Selection of Psalms and Hymns for public and private use,
adapted to the services of the Church of England. In this edition
he had the assistance of the Sheffield editor, the Moravian
Montgomery, who not only printed the book and collabo-
rated in it, but contributed some 50 of his own hymns. It
was presumably at his suggestion, too, that the book intro-
duced the Christmas hymn, 'Christians, awake' *6i f 21
73, in the familiar version a reduction (further re-
duced in E.H. and S.P.} from 48 lines to 36 of the original
written in 1749 as a Christmas gift for his daughter by
John Byrom (1691-1763), a former Fellow of Trinity,
Cambridge, who became a well-known teacher of short-
hand and eventually settled in Manchester. 297 When
CotterilPs book was put into use part of his congregation
took umbrage : and a suit was brought against him in the
York Consistory Court. Through the mediation of Arch-
bishop Vernon-Harcourt, however, a compromise was
effected. Cotterill withdrew his book: and in 1820 a

194

METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

revised and smaller edition was issued under the Arch-
bishop's supervision and at his expense. The battle on
behalf of hymnody was thus effectively won. Its enemies
continued to attack it : but no further legal adion was
attempted. A further shower of hymnals followed, in
which the influence of CotterilPs was very marked. The
metrical psalms did not yet disappear : but they were only
used in selections and were accompanied by hymns on the
same footing. The usual title of these collections was
"Psalms and Hymns".

Before leaving the period under review mention should
be made of two pairs of hymn-writers who fall within it
but lie off the main track of the movement, at once Evan-
gelical and within the framework of the National Church,
that we have been describing. The first pair were Evan-
gelical clergymen who found themselves unable to accom-
modate themselves to the Church's system and pursued
paths of their own Rowland Hill (1744-1833) and
Thomas Kelly (1769-1854). The former, the son of a
Shropshire baronet, quitted his curacy to pradise for
twelve years an itinerant ministry and finally, in 1783,
established himself at the Surrey Chapel in Blackfriars
Road. He never renounced his Orders, but carried on a
very successful ministry in London for fifty years without
episcopal sanction. On opening his chapel he printed a
Collection of Psalms and Hymns, for which his organist com-
piled a tune-book c. 1800. Hill was an enthusiast for
Sunday Schools and popularized the idea of a children's
hymnody. He wrote the hymn that has been recast as
'Lo ! round the throne a glorious band' *435-

Kelly was an Irishman who was ordained in 1792 and
worked for a time in Dublin in collaboration with Hill.
Both were inhibited by the Archbishop, who disapproved
of their evangelistic methods. Thereupon Kelly began to
preach in unconsecrated buildings, and finally, unlike his
friend, seceded from the Church altogether to found a

195

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

seel of his own, now extinft. He was an extremely prolific
writer, his hymns totalling 751 in all. Three of them are
very well known : 'The Head that once was crowned with
thorns' *30i fi47 t J 75> 'We sing the praise of Him who
died 5 *200 f5 10 J I 32 and 'The Lord is risen indeed' *5O4
fGay : and two others are hardly less so : 'Through the day
Thy love has spared us' *25 J28i and 'Come, see the
place where Jesus lay' *i39-

The personal link that united Hill and Kelly is repro-
duced in the case of the other pair of hymn-writers
Reginald Heber (1783-1826) and Henry Hart Milman
(1791-1868). But whereas the two former diverged on one
side from the main track of Evangelical Church hymnody,
the latter two diverged from it on the opposite side. Heber
and Milman were not Evangelicals, but High Churchmen
in the sense of their time. Of the two Heber is the more
important, as the initiator of a movement in which
Milman only collaborated. The son of an old and wealthy
family, he went up to Brasenose College, Oxford, where
he won the Newdigate with a poem, Palestine, which is
practically the only prize-poem that has secured more
than an ephemeral fame. In 1807 he became Vicar of the
family living of Hodnet, Salop. Here he combined a
devoted ministry to his flock with the practice of litera-
ture, writing for the Quarterly Review, editing Jeremy
Taylor and enjoying the friendship of some of the leading
men of letters of his time. He had always been deeply
interested in foreign missions, especially work in India :
and when in 1823 he was offered the see of Calcutta he
accepted it. For three years he laboured unceasingly,
travelling immense distances and accomplishing a signal
work. He died worn out at Trichinopoly in 1826.

As a hymn-writer Heber is important not only on
account of his personal output but as inaugurating a new
type of hymn the "literary hymn", aiming not merely
at the expression of religious feeling but also at delibe-

196

METHODISTS AND EVANGELICALS

rately controlling that expression by the canons of the

poetic art. 298 At the same time he carried on the principle,

already put into pradice by Basil Woodd and others, of

adapting hymnody to the requirements of the Church's

year. On these lines he projected at Hodnet a Church

hymn-book which should be at the same time "a collection

of sacred poetry". For this he not only collected materials

from earlier sources, but wrote hymns himself and asked

his literary friends, including Scott, Southey and Milman,

to write them too. Actually only Milman did so. An

attempt was also made to secure for his hymnal the

authorization of the Primate and the Bishop of London :

but the cautious prelates, though sympathetic, shrank

from so definite a step. Heber's collection travelled with

him in manuscript to India, and was only published after

his death, with the title Hymns written and adapted to the

Weekly Church Service of the Tear and a personal dedication

to the Archbishop of Canterbury. Its contents consisted of

57 hymns by Heber himself, 12 by Milman and 29 by

other writers. Of Heber's own hymns the best, as the most

famous, is 'Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord GOD Almighty' *i6o

f 162 +187. Others are : 'From Greenland's icy mountains'

*358 t547> 'Brightest and best of the sons of the morning'

*643 J4i, 85, 'The Son of GOD goes forth to war' *

1 2 02" 216, 'Virgin-born, we bow before Thee' *622

'Goo that madest earth and heaven' (verse i only) *26

1 2 68 46, and the two beautiful Eucharistic hymns,

'Bread of the world' *7i4 1305 ^265 and 'O most merciful'

t3 2 3 t 2 ?6- Of the hymns by Milman, who later became

Dean of St. Paul's and the eminent historian of Latin

Christianity, the best is the splendid Palm Sunday hymn,

'Ride on, ride on, in majesty' *gg |620 137. Others

are 'O help us, Lord ; each hour of need' *27g t&3 114

and 'When our heads are bowed with woe' *3gg

197

CHAPTER IX

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND
AFTER

BISHOP HEBER'S attempt to provide a hymnal
that should be at the same time "literary" and
"liturgical" unexceptionable as poetry and
adapted to the varying requirements of the Church's year
was not destined to any great success, so far as adual
use of his collection was concerned. Indeed, quite apart
from anything else, the lack of suitable tunes was an in-
superable difficulty. Yet it may rightly be regarded as a
landmark in the process by which hymns came to achieve
their present position in Anglican worship. In addition to
the permanent contributions that it made to English
hymnody in the shape of individual hymns, its significance
lies in two directions first, in its character as definitely
a "hymn-book" with only a few psalms introduced that
could be worked into its scheme, as opposed to the
"psalms and hymns" on an equal footing of the con-
temporary Evangelical collections ; and, secondly, in the
work that it did in helping to break down the prejudice
against hymns which still persisted in non-Evangelical
circles.

In this latter respecl, however, its influence was slight
as compared with the truly revolutionary change that was
to be set in motion soon afterwards by the coming of the
Oxford Movement. In the same year (1827) m which
Heber's Hymns first saw the light John Keble published
his Christian Tear. This was in no sense a hymnal, but a

198

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

collection of pious meditations on the liturgical round of
fast and festival. Its significance lay in the mild glow of
" Catholic" sentiment an inheritance from the Laudian
divines of the seventeenth century with which the poet
contrived to invest his themes, and which unquestionably
did much to prepare men's minds for the great Movement
that was speedily to be inaugurated by his famous sermon
on "National Apostasy" in 1833 and to be given shape and
substance in the Traffs for the Times. The essence of the
Tractarian position was the appeal to Catholic antiquity :
and this was to have important results in hymnody as in
weightier matters. Hitherto the Hymn, with its Methodist
and Evangelical associations, had been deeply suspect to
those who prided themselves on a loyal and conservative
Churchmanship. Such men had constituted themselves
the champions of Psalmody, despite the taint of its
Genevan origin, because they disliked Hymnody far more.
This view appears to have been shared at first by most of
the Tractarians themselves. But soon the logic of fads
began to operate irresistibly in favour of a practice which
a study of ancient liturgical forms had revealed as no mere
schismatic innovation, but as an integral part of the vener-
able Catholic order of worship. This being so, those who
desired to restore to the Church of England its Catholic
heritage must be careful not to neglect this part of it
both by using the old Catholic hymns in translated form
and also by the production of new hymns that should
share their spirit and atmosphere. Such new hymns, like
the old, must be less an expression of personal experience
and need than a reflection of the Church's order of
doctrine and worship. In a word, they must be, first and
foremost, "liturgical". In them should be heard the voice
"not of the individual believer, but of the worshipping
Church". 29 9

So far as translation was concerned, Keble's pupil and
friend, Isaac Williams (1802-65), Fellow of Trinity,

o 199

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Oxford, and later Newman's curate at St. Mary's, had
already made a start even before the formal inception of
the Movement in 1833 ; although it would appear that his
versions were not made with any idea of their being used
in public worship, but simply for his "personal edifica-
tion". Indeed he has told us that he chose for them "un-
rhythmical harsh metres" with the express objecl of
excluding such use, which he regarded as "unautho-
rized". 300 Williams's translations were not made from the
hymns in the mediaeval service-books, which at this
period were virtually inaccessible, but from those in the
"neo-Gallican" French breviaries of the later seventeenth
and eighteenth centuries. He himself has related in his
Autobiography how about 1829 he can ie across a copy of the
Paris Breviary brought from France by a friend, and how
he and Keble were "very much struck". 301 At once he set
to work to make English versions of some of its contents,
which were published in the British Magazine from 1833
onwards and were brought together in 1839 in a volume
with the title Hymns from the Parisian Breviary. This included
a number of hymns that have since become well known,
including C O Word of GOD above' *395t I 7 I 3 < O heavenly
Jerusalem' *42g 1251 and the splendid hymn for
Apostles, Williams's masterpiece, 'Disposer supreme'
*43i jiyS the last a translation from Santeuil. In the
previous year he had published a volume of sacred poems,
The Cathedral^ in which he worked out the symbolism of
the component parts of a great church : but the form of
these poems makes them unsuitable for use as hymns.
Williams's best-known original hymn, 'Be Thou my
guardian and my guide' *s8s fs6g Jioo, appeared in
1842 in a little book called Hymns on the Catechism ; and
the Lenten hymn, 'Lord, in this Thy mercy's day' *Q4
(76, in a much more ambitious collection, The Baptistery,
published in the same year.

Meanwhile side by side with Isaac Williams two other

200

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

translators had been at work. One of these, John Chandler
(1806-76), who became Vicar of Witley, Surrey, in 1837,
was directly inspired by Williams's efforts. For some time
he had been anxious to see the ancient prayers of the
Liturgy companioned by hymns of corresponding date
instead of the hymns in current use, "many of which", he
felt, were "from sources to which our Primitive Apostolic
Church would not choose to be indebted". Having seen
Williams's versions in the British Magazine he felt that
many of them provided exactly what was required, and
he decided to follow his example. "So," he tells us, "I got
a copy of the Parisian Breviary [1736] and one or two
other old books of Latin Hymns, especially one compiled
by Georgius Cassander, printed at Cologne in the year
1556, and regularly applied myself to the work of selection
and translation." 302 The result was seen in a collection
issued in 1837, The Hymns of the Primitive Church. The title
was hardly accurate, as most of the Latin originals dated
from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries : but pre-
sumably Chandler was not aware of this. His translations,
which were very free but also very singable, speedily
found their way into hymn-books : and a considerable
number of them are familiar. The best known are : 'On
Jordan's bank the Baptist's cry' *50 fg, 'Conquering
kings their titles take' *i75 "]"37, 'In stature grows the
Heavenly Child' 146=^*78, 'As now the sun's declining
rays' *i3 "[265 and 'Christ is our corner-stone' *23Q.

The year in which Chandler's collection appeared saw
also the publication of another, with the title Ancient
Hymns from the Roman Breviary, for Domestick ' Use. ... To
which are added Original Hymns. The author of this, Richard
Mant (1776-1848), was an English-born divine who after
being Rector of St. Botolph's, Bishopsgate, held three
Irish sees in succession Killaloe (1820), Down and
Connor (1823) and Dromore (1842). Here again the
versions were very free : nor had the originals much better

201

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

claim to be described as "ancient", being taken from the
Roman Breviary of 1632, in which the mediaeval Office
Hymns had been ruthlessly mangled to satisfy the classical
taste of the Renaissance. However, in the then state of
liturgical science no one knew or cared about such things.
The hymns were "from the Latin" that was enough.
Indeed the elegant Latinity of Mant's and Chandler's
originals appealed to men with a classical education far
more than the really "ancient" hymns could have done,
even if these had been available. Of Mant's versions one
figures in most hymnals, viz. the hymn for Apostles, 'Let
the round world with songs rejoice' ji76=*754. His
version of Stabat mater provides the basis (with many
alterations) of that in E.H. tn5- Another Passion hymn,
'See the destined day arise' *ii3 jiio, is based on parts
of Fortunatus's Pange lingua, but with such freedom that
it can hardly be described as a translation. Mant's best
and best-known hymn, however, is one of the "original"
hymns included in the 1837 volume, 'Bright the vision
that delighted' *i6i f372 460 ; another being 'For all
Thy saints, O Lord' tig6=*448.

The new interest in Latin hymns aroused by these pro-
ductions was greatly strengthened when in 1838 John
Henry Newman (1801-90), then the leading Tractarian
of them all and destined after his conversion to Rome in
1845 to become an Oratorian, and finally (1879) Cardinal,
published two volumes entitled Hymni Ecclesiae, which
made the text of a large number of them for the first time
easily accessible to the English reading public. Here again
the hymns, or at least the great majority, were far from
representing the authentic "ancient" hymnody of the
Catholic Church. But at least Newman appears to have
been aware of the limitations of his collection in this
resped. The 199 hymns in the first volume were selected
from the Paris Breviary ; the 1 30 hymns in the second
(which include some duplicates) from the Roman

202

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

Breviary and the English mediaeval Breviaries of Sarum
and York. At the end were appended two collections of
'Proses', taken from the Paris Missal and the York Pro-
cessional respectively. The purpose of Newman's work
was to enrich private devotion, pending the time when the
Church of England, condemned since the Reformation
(at least officially) to the use of nothing but the metrical
psalter, should again be found worthy to have a hymnody
of her own. As the preface puts it, with the true Newman
eloquence :

She waits for the majestic course [of Providence] to perfect
in its own good time what she cannot extort from it ; for the
gradual drifting of precious things upon her shores, now one
and now another, out of which she may complete her rosary
and enrich her beads beads and rosary more pure and true
than those which at the command of duty she flung away.

Meanwhile those who can make use of them will do well

to revert to the discarded collections of the ante-reform era,
[which] are far more profitable to the Christian than the light
and wanton effusions which are their present substitute among
us.

Among the "precious things" spoken of in his preface
Newman may well have contemplated such translations
of the ancient Latin hymns as those to which Williams and
Chandler had already set their hand. But his own experi-
ments in this direction were neither numerous nor
particularly successful : he was content to supply an abund-
ance of materials for others to work upon. His single con-
tribution (at least in his Tractarian days) appeared in
Tratf; 75, 'On the Roman Breviary', which contained 14
translations taken from that source. Of these only two
have survived in A.M. the hymn for Terce, 'Come,
Holy Ghost, Who ever One' *g and the Compline hymn,
'Now that the daylight dies away' *i6. Neither is much
used : and neither has found a place in E.H.

203

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Newman's reputation as a hymn-writer rests on quite
other grounds. His two famous hymns were original com-
positions and were never intended for use as hymns at all.
By a curious irony, indeed, one of them, 'Lead, kindly
light' *266 1425 t554> represents, in the intense subjec-
tivity of its mood, the very opposite of everything that
Newman himself regarded as suitable to a hymn. Like
many of the Evangelical hymns, it was originally written
as an outlet for the author's own personal emotion. He
has told the story in his Apologia. While travelling in Italy
with Hurrell Froude early in 1833, he was weighed down
by the thought of the peril threatening the Church of
England from the triumphant Liberalism of the Reform
era and became conscious of a "mission" to save her. At
Leonforte in Sicily he was stricken down with fever :

My servant thought that I was dying, and begged for my
last directions; I gave them, as he wished ; but I said, "I shall
not die ... for I have not sinned against light". . . . Towards
the end of May I left for Palermo. ... I was aching to get
home ; yet for want of a vessel I was kept at Palermo for three
weeks. ... At last I got off in an orange-boat, bound for
Marseilles. Then it was that I wrote the lines, "Lead, kindly
light", which have since become well known. We were be-
calmed a whole week in the Straits of Bonifacio. I was writing
verses the whole time of my passage. 303

Immediately after his return to England Keble preached
his famous sermon, and the Oxford Movement began.
The poem was published in the British Magazine in 1834
and again in Lyra Apostolica (1836). Newman's other
famous hymn, 'Praise to the Holiest in the height' * 1 72
f47i 625, belongs to a much later period, when he had
been for many years a Roman Catholic. It is part of the
'Chorus of Angelicals' from his poem The Dream of
Gerontius, written in 1865. Another excerpt from the
same poem, 'Firmly I believe and truly', forming part
of the dying Gerontius's profession of faith, appears as
a hymn in E.H. J39 -

204

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

If the Tradarian leaders inclined, at any rate at first,
to share the general "High Church" objection of the time
to the singing of hymns at all in public worship, a number
of their followers were anxious, like Chandler, to intro-
duce translations of Latin hymns as "Catholic" rivals to
the hymns popularized by the Evangelicals. It was felt,
too, that since it was impossible to substitute the Breviary
Offices for those of the Prayer Book, the use of such hymns
would at least serve to impart a Catholic atmosphere to
the latter, and also help towards a more adequate observ-
ance of seasons and saints' days. This was the line adopted
at Margaret Chapel (the forerunner of the present All
Saints' , Margaret Street) , which had become the chief focus
of Traclarian influence in London and sought to provide
a model of what Traclarian worship should be. In 1837
its Incumbent, William Dodsworth, published a collection
for use there entitled A Selection of Psalms, to which are added
Hymns chiefly ancient. Four years later Chandler rearranged
and expanded his original volume in the form of a hymnal
with the title The Hymns of the Church, mostly Primitive,
Collected., Translated and Arranged for Public Use. In 1849
a new collection of Introits and Hymns was printed for
use in Margaret Chapel : and other collections appeared
framed on similar lines.

Meanwhile other translators had been in the field,
whose work was drawn upon in the later of these collec-
tions. Three may be mentioned here. The first, Frederick
Oakeley (1802-80), has been spoken of earlier (p. 98) in
connection with his translation of Adeste fideles. A former
Fellow of Balliol, he succeeded Dodsworth in 1839 as
Incumbent of Margaret Chapel, for the congregation of
which he wrote his famous version in 1841. He became a
Roman Catholic in 1845 the same year as Newman.
A second translator was W. J. Copeland (1804-85), who
in 1848 published his Hymns for the Week and Hymns for the
Seasons, Translated from the Latin. Copeland, a Fellow of

205

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Trinity, Oxford, had been Newman's curate at Little-
more, but remained faithful to the Church of his baptism
and spent the last 36 years of his life as Rector of Farnham,
Essex. He is represented in A.M. by his versions of three
of the seasonal Compline hymns *63, 95, 141. Of these the
Lenten one, 'O Christ, Who art the Light and Day 5 , is also
in E.H. |8i. More important is Edward Caswall (1814-
78), who in 1850 went over to Rome and joined Newman
at the Birmingham Oratory. The year before his con-
version he published Lyra Catholica (1849), containing
197 translations from the Roman Breviary and Missal and
from other sources. A number of these have achieved wide
currency, especially 'Hark ! a thrilling voice is sounding 5

*47=t5 ' M Y GoD > l love Thee ' * 106 T 8o > 'Bethlehem,
of noblest cities' |4 *7^ 'All ye who seek a comfort
sure' J7i *ii2, and the translation in C.M. of Jesu
dulcis memoria, 'Jesu, the very thought of Thee' *i78 t4iQ-

None of the earlier Tractarian collections succeeded in
winning more than a limited local use: nor did they
deserve to do so. Their defects and the defects of the trans-
lators whose work they embodied were exposed with
merciless rigour in an article on "English Hymnology"
contributed by Neale to the Christian Remembrancer in its
issue of October, i84g. 304 It was pointed out that in the
majority of cases these translators had preferred the com-
paratively modern (and sometimes even heretical) pro-
duds of the Paris Breviary to the really ancient hymns of
the Church ; that they had failed to reproduce the metres
of the originals ; and that (worst of all) their work be-
trayed "great carelessness, haste and slovenliness". No
hymnal based on such material could be worthy of general
acceptance.

Having thus performed the negative task of criticism
Neale proceeded to the positive and practical one of
showing a more excellent way and not merely of show-
ing it but of doing himself the bulk of the work involved.

206

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

Of the Tradarian hymn-writers he stands out as incom-
parably the first. Indeed, it is no exaggeration to say that,
along with Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley, he stands at
the head of all other English hymn-writers, even though
his achievement lay in the field of translation rather than
of original composition. The external side of his short life
can be quickly told. John Mason Neale (1818-65) was the
son of a clergyman of "pronounced Evangelical opinions"
who had been Senior Wrangler and Fellow of St. John's,
Cambridge. He went up in 1836 to Trinity College, Cam-
bridge, where he obtained a Scholarship and was reputed
the best classic of his year : but his lack of mathematical
aptitude compelled him to take an ordinary degree. He
was none the less elected Fellow of Downing College. At
Cambridge he threw himself with enthusiasm into the
Church movement and was one of the founders of the
Cambridge Camden Society for the study of ecclesiology.
After a stay in Madeira necessitated by lung trouble he
was appointed in 1846 Warden of Sackville College, East
Grinstead, where he remained without receiving further
preferment to the end of his life. Yet from this insignificant
centre described by his friend Littledale as "an obscure
almshouse with a salary of 27 a year" and despite his
physical frailty, Neale contrived to do a work on behalf of
the Anglo-Catholic Revival of which it is hardly possible
to exaggerate the extent or importance. Besides his
achievement in the field of hymnody, he wrote The
History of the Eastern Church, in 5 volumes (1847-73)
still a standard work ; A History of the Jansenist Church in
Holland (1858) ; a 4-volume Commentary on the Psalms
(1860-74) in collaboration with Littledale; translations
of the Primitive Liturgies of the East ; together with essays
on liturgiology, articles, sermons and even stories. Nor
was it only with his pen that he found an outlet for his
zeal : he was also a man of aclion. An enthusiastic cham-
pion of the religious life for women, he successfully

207

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

founded the well-known Sisterhood of St. Margaret at
East Grinstead in the teeth of bitter popular prejudice and
opposition, which on one occasion nearly cost him his life.

It is, however, with Neale's contribution to hymnody
that we are here concerned. The ideas on which he worked
in making a hymnal for Anglican use were rigid indeed,
and thoroughly consonant with his almost incredibly
mediaeval cast of mind. They amounted, in fact, to
nothing less than the throwing overboard of English post-
Reformation hymns altogether and the substitution of
translations of the Latin hymns in use in England in the
Middle Ages. Further, these hymns were to be sung to
their own plainsong melodies, which of course made it
necessary that the translations should be in the same
metres as the originals. These were the principles em-
bodied in the Hymnal Noted, of which the first part ap-
peared in 1852, containing 46 hymns mostly from the
Sarum books, and the second, containing 59 more hymns,
in 1854. Of the 105 hymns 94 were by Neale himself.
Another translator was one of Neale's co-editors, Benjamin
Webb (1820-85), later Vicar of St. Andrew's, Wells
Street, and Prebendary of St. Paul's, whose versions in-
cluded 'O love how deep, how broad, how high' *iy3
t459, and 'Sing we triumphant hymns of praise' f^G.
The hymns were accompanied by their proper melodies,
the musical side of the work being under the care of the
Rev. Thomas Helmore.

Neale's experiment was courageous and interesting, and
may be regarded as embodying the Traclarian ideal of a
"Catholic" hymnal in its most uncompromising form.
But in the nature of things it could not hope to win more
than a very limited success : and in many quarters it
merely excited ridicule. To ears attuned to the gushing
rapture of Evangelical hymns the majority of Neale's
versions must have sounded terribly grim and austere :
yet his hymnal provided no jam to mingle, with the

208

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

powder. As for the "Gregorian" melodies accompanying
them, the ordinary organist and choir were unable even
to read the notation in which they were set out ; while to
the ordinary congregation their idiom sounded strange
and unattractive, as indeed it largely continues to do to
this day. The Hymnal Noted, in fact, appealed only to
churches determined to be "Catholic" at any price.

None the less, it is of great importance, not only as
expressing an ideal, but also on account of the large con-
tributions it has made to subsequent hymnals, especially
(but by no means exclusively) those of the "High Church"
type. For example, Neale's versions bulk largely both in
A.M. and E.H., though the text of many has undergone
not a little emendation. A considerable number of them
are hardly of the kind to win great popularity : but others
have achieved an almost universal fame. Neale's best-
known hymns need not be dealt with here : for we have
already spoken of them in an earlier chapter in connection
with their originals.

Besides the translations in the Hymnal Noted Neale also
produced many others. Already in 1851 he had put forth
a volume of Mediaeval Hymns and Sequences, in which a
number of hymns that figured in the Hymnal Noted were
published for the first time, including his versions of
Pange lingua, Vexilla Regis and Urbs beata. The Sequences
in this collection were the first translations of this kind of
hymn offered to the English public. Among them was the
"Alleluiatic Sequence" *2Q5 J494? an d a number by (or
attributed to) Adam of St. Victor, whom Neale esteemed
as "to my mind the greatest Latin poet, not only of
mediaeval, but of all ages" ! 305 Believers in transmigra-
tion might certainly put forward more absurd theories
than that the soul of the French poet had taken up its
abode in the nineteenth century English one the resemb-
lances between them are so striking, especially in their love
of Scriptural typology. Neale's (partial) translation of the

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Rhythm of Bernard de Morlaix followed in 1858, and was
accompanied by a descriptive preface. This volume is the
source of the quartet of hymns of which 'Jerusalem the
golden' is the best known. A further collection of Hymns
on the Joys and Glories of Paradise was published in 1865.
In addition to these translations Neale also published two
important and valuable collections of Latin hymnal texts
one of hymns from various Breviaries and Missals in
1 85 1 and another of Sequences in 1 852.

It is not only, however, by his translations from the
Latin that Neale has put English Christianity under an
undying obligation. What he did for the hymnody of the
mediaeval Church of the West he also did, if less abund-
antly, for that of the East in his Hymns of the Eastern Church
(1862). Here his task was more difficult : for (as he himself
explains in his preface) he could neither reproduce the
form of his originals nor present them in their entirety. 306
But even with these handicaps he managed to produce (as
we have seen in an earlier chapter) a number of hymns
that have become classical.

Besides his translations from Latin and Greek, Neale
produced a considerable number of original hymns as
well. Two small volumes of Hymns for Children were pub-
lished in 1842 and 1844 : the first including 'Around the
throne of GOD a band' *335 J243 239 and the Embertide
hymn, 'Christ is gone up' *32 |i66 ; and the second the
other Embertide hymn, 'The earth, O Lord, is one great
field' |i68=*354. The well known 'Come, ye faithful,
raise the anthem' *302 t3^ ^ s a drastic recasting of a
hymn by one Job Hupton, published in the Gospel Magazine
in 1805. It appeared first in an article of Neale's in the
Christian Remembrancer, July, 1863, as an illustration of
how a crude original might be improved. (The version
in S.P. has ventured in turn to "improve" on Neale's
improvement, $477.) A final collection of Sequences and
Hymns was published after the author's death (1866). Nor

2IO

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

should we omit a passing tribute to Neale as a writer of
carols. Some of those contained in his Carols for Christmas-
tide and Eastertide (1852-3), and mostly based on mediaeval
originals, have become classics of their kind. The best
known of all is 'Good King Wenceslas' in this case an
original composition.

So vast an output, in addition to all his other literary
work, is sufficient in itself to prove Neale's amazing
facility. For this, of course, the usual price had to be paid.
Compilers of hymnals have often resolved at the outset on
"Neale pure and undefiled" : but they have seldom been
able to maintain this attitude in praftice. His versification
is for the most part easy and graceful, at least when
iambic measures are concerned : for when he attempts
such metres as sapphics and elegiacs he is much less
successful. His power of finding rhymes is nothing less
than astounding, and may well be the despair of those who
attempt a task similar to his own. But he is always liable
to sudden lapses and can be banal and even absurd on
occasion. Among his manifold gifts a sense of humour was
hardly included, at least where what is Catholic and
mediaeval was concerned. This mediaevalism of his made
him a good deal of a portent even in his own romantic
age : and it is even more unsympathetic to our own. The
reader of his Colletted Hymns will find not a little that will
amuse rather than edify him. Yet if we judge him by his
best work Neale's fame stands secure and in his own
line supreme.

II

Hitherto the two streams of Evangelical and Tradarian
hymnody respectively have pursued their course apart.
But we have now reached a period when they are to
mingle in hymn-books of the modern "comprehensive"
type. Here it was the High Churchmen who were to take
the lead. So far as they were concerned, the fight for the

211

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

recognition of hymnody had been won : and the New
Version and the Old (apart from a few fragments of the
former turned to other use) vanished henceforth into the
limbo of things forgotten. All that remained was to solve
the practical problem of evolving a scheme of hymnody
which, while giving a due place to the ancient liturgical
hymns of Christendom, should at the same time meet
popular taste and requirements by including such
elements from other sources as could be acclimatized in
the "High Church" atmosphere. Even Neale himself was
not so uncompromising as the plan of the Hymnal Noted
might suggest. Not only did he add translations from the
Greek service-books to those which he had already made
from the Latin and compose hymns of his own, but in his
article in the Christian Remembrancer of October, 1849, he
expressly asserts that even the hymns of Dissenters are not
to be entirely forbidden to Churchmen. It is true that he
condemns most of them, and damns even the rest with
faint praise. But their origin is not by itself to exclude
them. Their acceptance or rejection must be determined
"not on the bare simple ground that their authors did not
hold the Catholic faith" but "by Convocation on their
own merit or demerit" with, of course, such emenda-
tion as might be made necessary by their often "heretical"
character as they stood. 307

As things turned out and no doubt fortunately
Convocation had nothing to do with the matter. The
immense development of hymnody in the second half of
the nineteenth century was the result not of official action
but of private enterprise. But the guiding idea behind it
was very much the same as that suggested by Neale, only
with a more generous treatment of non-Catholic material
than Neale himself would probably have been prepared
to endorse. Before, however, we attempt a sketch of "the
spate of hymn-books" (to borrow Dr. Dearmer's phrase)
which set in after 1850, it may be well to say something

212

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

about certain elements included in them that have not
yet been noticed in these pages.

i . It will be convenient to mention first certain further
translators of Latin and Greek hymns not so much
because of their intrinsic importance as by way of com-
pleting what has been already said on the subjecl:. Of these
two figure here on the strength in each case of a well-
known version of a single hymn W. J. Irons (1812-83),
Prebendary of St. Paul's, and J. R. Woodford (1820-85),
Bishop of Ely, translators of the Dies irae and Adoro te
devote respectively. Another name is Robert Campbell
(1814-68), a Scots advocate who was born a Presbyterian,
became a devout member of the Episcopal Church of
Scotland, and finally joined the Church of Rome in 1852.
Two years before he had published a collection of Hymns
and Anthems for use . . . in the diocese of St. Andrews, contain-
ing a selection of his translations, along with a certain
amount of other material. Of the translations the best
known is the C.M. rendering of Chorus novae Hierusalem>
'Ye choirs of new Jerusalem' ^139 *i25- Others are a
second Easter hymn, 'At the Lamb's high feast we sing'
*i27 fi28 and the hymn for Evangelists (a cento from
.Adam of St. Vidor), 'Come, pure hearts, in sweetest
measure' *434 though in the latter case only verses i, 2
are his. The same collection also contained his beautiful
hymn on the Angels, 'They come, GOD'S messengers of
love' *424 t 2 4^ an original composition. Mention
should also be made of Jackson Mason (1833-89) not
to be confused, by the way, with the seventeenth-century
J[ohn] Mason, who wrote 'How shall I sing Thy majesty'.
He is of rather later date ; but may be included here for
the sake of convenience. He was Vicar of Settle, Yorks,
and contributed, besides original hymns, several trans-
lations to the A.M. First Supplement of 1889, including
two from Adam of St. Vidor, 'Come sing, ye choirs ex-
ultant' *62i JI79 and 'In royal robes of splendour' *620.

213

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Among translators of Greek hymns Neale, of course,
stands in a class entirely by himself. But we must not
forget Keble's beautiful version of 0a>s ZXapov, 'Hail,
gladdening Light' *i8, which was first published in the
British Magazine in 1834, nor omit a passing tribute to
A. W. Chatfield, who wrote 'Lord Jesus, think on me'
*i85 f 77, and R. M. Moorsom (*4go, 641), though these
are a little later than the date that we have reached.

2. It was not Latin and Greek hymnody only, however,
that was to be laid under contribution in the new hymnals.
We have seen that in the Reformation period an attempt
had been made to acclimatize some of the contemporary
Lutheran hymns, but without permanent result. Two
centuries later John Wesley successfully transplanted a
number of the later Lutheran hymns of the Pietist type.
But apart from these German hymnody remained a
sealed book to English worshippers. The credit of unlock-
ing its treasures belongs in the main to two ladies : Frances
Cox (1812-97) and Catherine Winkworth (1829-78). The
former published in 1841 her Sacred Hymns from the German,
containing 49 hymns with their original texts. In the
second edition of 1864 27 of these reappeared along with
29 new ones. A.M. contains 4 of her versions, the best
known being 'Jesus lives ! ' *i40 f 134 and 'Who are these
like stars appearing' *427 J204. Concerning Miss Wink-
worth Dr. Julian has said that "her translations have had
more to do with the modern revival of the English use of
German hymns than the versions of any other writer". 308
She was a woman of remarkable ability, not only an
excellent German scholar and a charming writer (her
Christian Singers of Germany is a classic of its kind), but also
an early pioneer on behalf of the higher education of
women. Her translations were published in Lyra Germanica,
of which the first series appeared in 1855 and the second
in 1858. Of these translations A.M. contains 8 and E.H.
9. The best known are : 'Now thank we all our GOD'

214

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

f533, 'Christ the Lord is risen again' *i36 t I2 9
'Praise to the Lord, the Almighty' *657 t536.

Along with the words of the German hymns the chorale-
melodies accompanying them also came into use a
process encouraged by the interest in the music of J. S.
Bach, which had its beginning in the first decade of the
nineteenth century (Samuel Wesley, Charles's musician
son, acling as chief pioneer) and was further stimulated
by the enthusiasm of Mendelssohn on his visits to England.
W. H. Havergal included a good many in his Old Church
Psalmody (1847) : and they were still more fully repre-
sented in Dr. Maurice's Choral Harmony of 1854 and
(especially) in the Church Psalter and Hymn Book of the same
year. The last book, edited (with Montgomery's assist-
ance) by a Sheffield clergyman, William Mercer, had
[Sir] John Goss (1800-80) as its musical editor and
was used for the nave evening services at St. Paul's until
supplanted by A.M. in iSyi. 309 But the most compre-
hensive and scholarly adaptation of German chorales for
English use is the Chorale Book for England (1863), in which
Miss Winkworth collaborated with Sterndale Bennett and
Otto Goldschmidt, the husband of the great Swedish
singer Jenny Lind and founder of the Bach Choir. "This
book," says Dr. Frere, "was for German hymnody what
the Hymnal Noted was for old Latin hymnody. It was too
much restricted in scope to become popular as a hymn-
book ; but nevertheless it had great erTecV 31

3. When to these treasures of earlier centuries trans-
lated from various foreign tongues is added the vast mass
of native material also inherited from the past, including
the hymns of Watts, the Wesleys and the earlier Evan-
gelicals, it is obvious that the compilers of the new
hymnals had already a vast field from which to make their
selection. But hymnody never stands still : and the genera-
tion that witnessed the rise of the Oxford Movement had
had its own contribution to make to the stock of English
p 215

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

original hymns. Even the Tractarians had not confined
themselves to translating old hymns, but had written new
ones as well. Newman, Isaac Williams, Gaswall and Neale
have been already spoken of in this connection. But the
outstanding figure is John Keble (1792-1866), the poet
and saint who from his quiet Hampshire vicarage of
Hursley set himself to rally what was left of the Tractarian
party after the shattering defections of 1 845 and 1 850, and,
along with his friend Pusey, did more than anyone else to
save from utter shipwreck the Movement which he had
inaugurated in 1833. It is true that, in exact analogy with
the case of Prudentius, his most celebrated hymns are all
fragments from the Christian Tear torn from their context :
but this has not prevented them from winning an immense
popularity in all English-speaking lands. Few compilers
of hymnals would dream of omitting 'New every morning
is the love' *4 J26o 31, 'Sun of my soul' *24 t 2 74 +55>
'Blest are the pure in heart' *26i f37o 455, 'When GOD
of old came down from heaven 5 *i54 t J 58 3 or even 'There
is a book who runs may read' *i68 1 497 664, with its
fine treatment of the sacramental aspect of Nature. To
the hymns from this source may be added, 'Ave Maria!
blessed Maid' f2i6. Besides the Christian Year Keble also
wrote a metrical translation of the Psalms (1839) and
Lyra Innocentium (1846) the latter a book about children
rather than a book ./or children : but neither of these has
been used with success as a source for hymns. In his later
years Keble turned to hymn-writing proper and con-
tributed to the Salisbury Hymn Book of 1857, edited by Earl
Nelson, great-nephew of the Admiral. But by this time his
powers were waning : and none of these hymns has won
the fame of those already mentioned. The best known are
the Rogation hymn, 'Lord in Thy name Thy servants
plead' *i43 t r 4 t 1 ? 1 an d the wedding hymn, 'The
voice that breath'd o'er Eden' *350 J348.

Side by side with Keble and Newman as a writer of

216

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

original hymns stands Frederick William Faber (1814-
63) ; though his first volumes of hymns only appeared in
1849, three years after he became a Roman Catholic.
Like Newman, he became an Oratorian: and he
founded the London branch of that congregation, which
since 1854 has had its seat at the Brompton Oratory.
Faber's Catholicism was of a far more emotional and full-
blooded type than that of the austere and reserved New-
man, who was often a good deal worried by his friend's
"extravagances" : but for that very reason it had a
stronger popular appeal. His temperament is reflecled in
his hymns, which are a sort of Catholic counterpart of
those of the Wesleys and of the Olney Hymns. Concerning
the latter, Faber confessed in the preface to his Hymns
that "they acled like a spell upon him for years, strong
enough to be for long a counter-influence to very grave
convictions, and even now to come back from time to time
unbidden to the mind". His emotionalism not infre-
quently degenerates into sentimentality : and some of his
hymns, like C O Paradise, O Paradise' and 'Hark ! hark,
my soul', when taken from their personal context, seem
positively nauseating to many people to-day. But the bst
of them, e.g. 'My GOD, how wonderful Thou art' *i6g
f 441 581 and 'O come and mourn with me awhile' *i 14
fin +140 are fine, moving hymns of their kind.

Two other hymn- writers who passed through Tradlarian-
ism to Roman Catholicism are Matthew Bridges (1800-
93) and Henry Collins (1827-1919). The former, a layman,
spent his later years in Canada. His best-known hymn is
'Crown Him with many crowns' *304 fsSi. The latter
was a clergyman who became a Roman Catholic in 1857
and subsequently a Cistercian monk. In 1854 he pub-
lished a collection of Hymns for Missions containing two
contributions by himself the well-known 'Jesu, meek
and lowly' *i88 f4i6 and 'Jesu, my Lord, my GOD, my
All' *igi 1417.

217

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

4. The Evangelical contribution to hymnody during
the same period was not less important. Some of the best
loved of English hymns, in facl, are from this source.
Among them is what may almost certainly rank as the
most popular hymn in the English language, 'Abide with
me' *27 tS^S +437- Its author, Henry Francis Lyte (1793-
1847), was a former scholar of Trinity College, Dublin,
who was ordained in 1815 and some years afterwards
underwent the experience of Evangelical "conversion".
He was appointed in 1823 Perpetual Curate of Lower
Brixham, Devon, where he remained till his death. Like
Toplady, the author of 'Rock of ages', he was a consump-
tive. In the last September of his life (as his daughter
relates in the memoir prefaced to his Remains 31 1 ] he was
about to leave England for a more genial climate when

his family were surprised and almost alarmed at his announc-
ing his intention of preaching once more to his people. His
weakness, and the possible danger attending the effort, were
urged to prevent it, but in vain. ... He did preach, . . . amid
the breathless attention of his hearers. . . . He afterwards
assisted at the administration of the Holy Eucharist, and
though necessarily much exhausted . . .yet his friends had no
reason to believe it had been hurtful to him. In the evening
of the same day he placed in the hands of a near and dear
relative the little hymn, 'Abide with me', with an air of his
own composing.

This has generally been regarded as implying that the
hymn had been written just before, as an expression of the
dying man's sense of helplessness and need of Divine
strength. But there now seems reason to believe that it
had aclually been written many years previously. In the
Spectator for 061. 3, 1925, Dr. T. H. Bindley made the
assertion that it was written in 1820 when

Lyte, as a young clergyman, was staying with the Hores at
Pole Hore, near Wexford. He went out to see an old friend,
William Augustus Le Hunte, who lay dying, and who kept
repeating the phrase, "Abide with me". After leaving the bed-

2T8

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

side, Lyte wrote the hymn and gave a copy of it to Sir Francis
Le Hunte, William's brother, among whose papers it re-
mained. . . . These details were given me some years ago by
Sir George Ruthven Le Hunte, grandson of William Augustus,

and I have recently had them confirmed by members of his
family. 3 12

In any case the hymn was not originally intended as an
evening hymn at all: the "eventide" in the first line
clearly refers to the close of life's day, not to evening in the
literal sense. Its immense popularity may be regarded as
largely due to its melodious and eminently singable tune,
written by W. H. Monk. It is often said to have been com-
posed by him in ten minutes : 3 1 3 but this is probably only
one of the innumerable legends that cluster round the
origin of popular hymns.

In 1834 Lyte published a volume entitled The Spirit of
the Psalms, containing over 280 free paraphrases of
individual psalms. From this are taken three well-known
hymns : 'GoD of mercy, GOD of grace' *2i8 1395 Jiyo
(ps. Ixv) ; 'Pleasant are Thy courts above' *240 "[469
(ps. Ixxxiv) ; and his masterpiece, 'Praise, my soul, the
King of heaven' *2g8 J47o 623 (ps. ciii), so magnifi-
cently matched with Goss's great tune (first published in
a minor collection of 1869). Another of his hymns is
'When at Thy footstool, Lord, I bend' * 245 one of the
most characteristically Evangelical of all Evangelical
hymns.

A contemporary of Lyte was Sir Robert Grant (1785-
1838), who died when Governor of Bombay. His splendid
C O worship the King' *i67 f466 J6i8, based on Kethe's
version of Ps. civ, was first published in 1833. Repre-
sentative of a later and considerably different type of
Evangelicalism was Henry Alford (1810-71), a Fellow of
Trinity, Cambridge, who became Dean of Canterbury in
1857. He was a man of extraordinarily varied accomplish-
ments and wrote a Commentary on the Bible that enjoyed

219

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

immense reputation in its day. Opinion varies as to
Alford's merits as a hymn-writer : but the man who wrote
'Come, ye thankful people, come' *382 faSg 9 and 'Ten
thousand times ten thousand' *222 1486 may at least
claim to have known how to suit the popular taste.

Side by side with these masculine names may be set two
feminine ones Harriet Auber (1771-1862), author of
'Our blest Redeemer, ere He breathed' *207 fi57 182,
and Charlotte Elliott (1789-1871), an invalid who com-
posed an Invalid's Hymn Book, in which first appeared
'Just as I am' *255 tS 1 ^ * 2 53 anc ^ 'Christian, seek not
yet repose' *26g I374 467.

in

The remarkable crop of new hymnals which marked
the decade after 1850 emanated in the main, as we have
said, from the High Church side. The Evangelicals
already had their books ; though even here it was soon
found necessary to discard some and to recast others. But
for High Churchmen hymn-singing was a new luxury
which could only be catered for by the production of
entirely new books. At first, indeed, these were so
numerous as to be positively an embarrassment. The year
(1852) that saw the appearance of the first part of the
Hymnal Noted gave birth as well to no less than three other
hymn-books of a more comprehensive type. These were :
A Hymnal for Use in the English Church, by the Rev. F. H.
Murray, Rector of Chislehurst ; Hymns and Introits compiled
for the use of the Collegiate Church ofCumbrae, by the Rev. G.
Cosby White, then its Provost ; and The Church Hymn and
Tune Book, edited by the Rev. W. J. Blew. The last had
Dr. H. J. Gauntlett as its musical editor : and most of his
well-known tunes first appeared in it. In 1853 followed
the Church Hymnal, edited by the Rev. W. Cooke and the
Rev. W. Denton, and in 1857 Earl Nelson's Salisbury
Hymn Book already mentioned.

220

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

All these hymnals embodied the same ideal of a book
that should combine the ancient hymns of the Catholic
Church with the best produces of more modern times. But
for that very reason they could only be competitors and
stand in one another's light. A project was therefore set on
foot for pooling their resources and evolving a common
book which, it was hoped, might not only secure the un-
divided support of churches of a definitely High Church
type but also gradually win its way on its merits into other
churches as well. Such was the genesis of the most cele-
brated and widely used of all Anglican hymnals, Hymns
Ancient and Modern. 514

The conceiver of the scheme was Mr Murray, who
secured the co-operation of the Rev. Sir H. W. Baker,
Vicar of Monkland, Herefordshire. Together they ap-
proached Mr. Cosby White, and towards the end of 1857
a small committee was formed to initiate the projecl. Next
year the editors of several other hymn-books agreed to co-
operate. In October an advertisement was inserted in the
Guardian, intimating that "The Editors of several existing
Hymnals, being engaged with others in the compilation
of a Book which they hope may secure a more general
acceptance from Churchmen, would be very thankful for
any suggestions from persons interested in the matter."
More than 200 clergymen replied : and a large com-
mittee was at once formed and held its first meeting in
January, 1859, with Sir H. W. Baker in the chair. Keble
did not actually join the Committee : but he took great
interest in the projecl and gave the advice : "If you wish
to make a Hymn Book for the use of the Church, make it
comprehensive."

On Nov. 1 8, 1859, a small paper-covered book, con-
taining 138 hymns, was issued "for temporary use and as
a specimen still open to revision". The musical editor was
Dr. William Henry Monk (1823-89), organist at King's
College, London, who suggested the admirably appro-

221

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

priate title "Hymns Ancient and Modern". The com-
pleted book (known to-day as the "Original Edition")
was published in 1861. Its significance has been thus
characterized by Dr. Louis Benson, an American Congre-
gationalist : "Its part in establishing, as it did, the type
and tone of the representative Church of England
Hymnody, and its influence on the Hymnody of other
denominations, entitle its publication to rank as one of the
great events in the Hymnody of the English-speaking
Churches." sis

The book contained 273 hymns, with accompanying
tunes, and made full provision for the feasts and seasons
of the Prayer Book. There were 132 translations of Latin
hymns and 10 of German: the remainder were English
hymns of all periods, nearly one-half being by living
authors. These included Milman, Keble, Faber and
Neale : but the largest contributor of all was the Chairman
of the Committee, Sir Henry William Baker (1821-77),
who was represented by 13 original hymns and 9 trans-
lations from the Latin. A good deal of Baker's work for the
book, now and later, was of the nature of pieces d* occasion
written to fill a gap, and is unlikely therefore to endure.
But 'The King of love my Shepherd is' *ig7 t4go 654
and 'Lord, Thy word abideth' *243 1436 570 appear to
have established themselves firmly. 'O praise ye the Lord'
*3o8 351, too, deserves to survive, if only as a "carrier"
for Sir Hubert Parry's noble tune, written for it much
later as part of an anthem.

Of the tunes in the Original Edition the great majority
were old, but there were a certain number of new ones too.
The largest contributors here were Monk himself (17),
the Rev. John Bacchus Dykes (1823-76), then Precentor
of Durham and later Vicar of St. Oswald's in that city (7),
and Sir Frederick A. Gore Ouseley (1825-89), Professor
of Music at Oxford (5). Of these Ouseley represented on
the whole the staid, solid manner inherited from the

222

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

better produces of the eighteenth century, while Monk
stood midway between this and the new "Victorian" type
of tune with its fluent, wistful melody and rather cloying
harmony inspired by Mendelssohn and Spohr. In Dykes
this new type stands forth full-blown. His style is to be
seen at its best in the three famous tunes contributed by
him to the 1861 book for 'Holy, Holy, Holy' *i6o, 'Jesu,
Lover of my soul' * 193 and 'Eternal Father, strong to save'
*37o; and at its weakest in two later insertions, 'How bright
these glorious spirits shine' *438 and 'Hark, my soul, it is
the Lord' *26o. Its merits and its defects alike recom-
mended it to contemporary taste : and in the 1875 edition
of the book Dykes's contribution had significantly risen to
55 tunes. Not only so, but a host of imitators hastened to
follow in his footsteps. It is the superabundance of this
kind of tune that makes Hymns Ancient and Modern so
characteristic of the epoch which produced it, and also
renders it so vulnerable a target for contemporary criti-
cism. On this subject more will be said in a later chapter.
But it should be added here in justice to Dykes and his
school that there are already signs of a tendency among
competent musicians to qualify the harsh judgments of a
generation ago, at least in regard to their more defensible
productions. As Sir Walford Davies and Dr. Harvey
Grace have pointed out in their book Music and Worship,
these "Viclorian" tunes have at least the quality of "sing-
ableness" in an eminent degree, and if their rhythm is un-
enterprising, it is for that very reason a rhythm "without
pitfalls for a congregation". 316

That the book met a real need was shown by the re-
markable success which it achieved from the beginning :
350,000 copies of it were sold in the first three years. This
success encouraged the promoters to expand it: and in
1868 an Appendix was issued, raising the number of
hymns to 386. In the additions "ancient" and "modern"
were again mingled : but now the latter were by far the

223

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

more numerous. The great bulk of the new hymns were by
contemporaries. Newman's two famous hymns now
appeared for the first time ; while Neale and Baker added
largely to their share, the former's contribution including
a number of his translations of Greek hymns. Of new
writers the most important were Bishop Christopher
Wordsworth of Lincoln (1807-85), who contributed 8
hymns from his Holy Tear (1862), among them being
'Alleluia ! Alleluia! hearts to heaven and voices raise 5
*i37 fisy +150 and 'Hark the sound of holy voices' *436
1 198 206 ; Professor William Bright (1824-1901), Canon
of Christ Church, Oxford, author of 'Once, only once and
once for all' *3 1 5 1327 and (later) of 'And now, O Father,
mindful of the love' *3i6 1302 +261 ; and Cecil Frances
Alexander (1823-95), wno contributed three hymns for
children, including 'Once in royal David's city' *32g
|6o5 +368 and 'There is a green hill far away' *332 |io6
131. (Her other most notable hymn, 'All things bright
and beautiful' *573 1587 444, did not appear until the
First Supplement of 1889.) Another important addition
is 'The Church's one foundation' *2i5 t4^9 +249, by the
Rev. S. J. Stone (1839-1900), later Vicar of St. Paul's,
Haggerston. Its familiar tune, 'Aurelia', by Dr. S. S.
Wesley, was originally written for another collection as a
setting of 'Jerusalem the golden'. As regards the music of
the book in general, the element of novelty was even more
striking here than in the case of the words, half of the tunes
being printed for the first time. Dykes's contribution was
largely increased : and other composers represented were
Henry Smart, John Stainer and Joseph Barnby.

The subsequent history of Hymns Ancient and Modern
must be more briefly summarized. In 1875 the Original
Edition with its Appendix was entirely recast, without,
however, disturbing the fundamental basis of the book.
There were a considerable number of omissions, many
additions, and not a little revision and alteration of the

224

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

existing material. Two names that now appear for the
first time deserve mention : Frances Ridley Havergal
(1836-79), a devout and accomplished Evangelical lady
who wrote many hymns mostly of a highly subjedive
type, of which 'I could not do without Thee' *i86 1572
may serve as a specimen, and William Walsham How
(1823-97), Re&or of Whittington, Salop, and later Bishop
of Bedford and (1888) the first Bishop of Wakefield, whose
contributions included his chef d'oeuvre Tor all the Saints'
*437 f64i 202 and the Rogationtide intercession, 'To
Thee, our GOD, we fly' *i42 J5^5- Barnby's popular
setting of the former first appeared in the 1889 Supple-
ment. It is vigorous and extremely singable, but has the
fatal defecl (among others) of being in a different metre
from the words! It is therefore being rightly supplanted
more and more by Vaughan Williams's noble tune 'Sine
nomine' 1641 202. Stanford's setting *437 iv is not less
excellent, but perhaps less congregational.

Fourteen years after the publication of the "Revised
Edition" of 1875 the so-called "First Supplement" was
issued, which added 165 hymns. It is notable for the
inclusion of a large number of the hymns of Charles
Wesley and other eighteenth-century writers. But a good
deal of the material included (and especially of the music)
was of inferior quality : and it is on the whole the weakest
part of the book as it stands. In this respect it offers a
conspicuous contrast to the "Second Supplement" of
1916. But this will be spoken of in the next chapter.

Great as was the success of Hymns Ancient and Modern
from the start, it was none the less regarded with suspicion
and dislike in many quarters, quite apart from the Evan-
gelicals, who naturally abhorred it both for its origin and
for much of its contents. Nowadays it has become so much
the "moderate" hymnal par excellence that it is difficult to
realize that there was a time when its use was often re-
garded as a party-badge and an offence to sober Church-

225

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

manship, and in some cases even led to serious disturb-
ances. For those who eyed it askance a less dubious and
provoking alternative was forthcoming in Church Hymns.,
which had its origin in a small collection issued in 1852
and grew through successive revisions into the large book
of 1871. Its leading compiler was John Ellerton (1826-93),
a disciple of F, D. Maurice and from 1876 to 1884 Redor
of Barnes. Ellerton was himself a hymn-writer of note.
Among his hymns are two that are universally popular :
'Saviour, again to Thy dear name we raise' *3i f 273 53
and 'The day Thou gavest' *477 f 277 56. The musical
edition of 1874 was under the care of Sir Arthur Sullivan,
who contributed to it many tunes of his own, including
the famous and, as many think, exceedingly vulgar
'St. Gertrude' for the Rev. S. Baring Gould's hearty pro-
cessional (originally written in 1865 for a Sunday School
feast at Horbury, Yorks), 'Onward, Christian soldiers'
*39i f 643 +397. Sullivan's share in the book combined
with its "average" Church tone to win for it much
success, and for a long time it was the only seriqus rival to
Hymns A. and M. Another hymnal representing a similar
moderate standpoint was the Church of England Hymn
Book (1880), edited by Prebendary Godfrey Thring. It
had considerable literary merits ; but never attained
to wide use.

But if for many Hymns A. and M. was too "Catholic",
there were others for whom it was not "Catholic" enough.
Hence the emergence of a number of hymnals framed on
similar lines but in such a fashion as to obviate this re-
proach. The Hymnal Noted was gradually expanded by
the addition of a large and very miscellaneous Appendix,
and later of a Supplement as well. Another book was
the People's Hymnal ( 1 867) , edited by Dr. Littledale. But the
most complete collection of this kind was the Hymnary
(1870), edited by Neale's old associate, Benjamin Webb,
with the assistance of Canon W. Cooke. It is specially rich

226

THE OXFORD MOVEMENT AND AFTER

in translations from the Latin, with a preference for the
hymns of Sarum Use. On the literary side it was rather an
austere and forbidding affair : but this was to some extent
compensated for by the floridity of its music, which was
edited by [Sir] Joseph Barnby, who had made a great
reputation through the excellence of the musical services
at Webb's church, St. Andrew's, Wells Street. Among the
musicians who contributed was Gounod : and Barnby
himself, a keen disciple of the French musician, was
copiously represented. His tunes were greatly admired in
their day : but their luscious and chromatic character
makes them displeasing now to critical ears. Along with
these hymnals proper should be mentioned two books
designed to make the fullest possible provision for Eucha-
ristic worship the Eucharistic Hymnal (1877) and the
Altar Hymnal (1884).

At the opposite extreme to those who used these books
stood the Evangelicals. These, for all their acute dis-
approval of Hymns A. and M., were unable to resist the
influence of the ideal for which it stood. More and more
the old collections of "Psalms and Hymns" tended to dis-
appear and to give place to "hymn-books" (in the strict
sense) of the new comprehensive type. Of these the best
and most important, destined increasingly to supplant the
others, was the Hymnal Companion, first issued in 1870
under the editorship of Edward Henry Bickersteth (1825-
1906), later Bishop of Exeter, and the author of 'Peace,
perfect peace' *537 1468. It was based on a careful study
of already existing hymnals, and, apart from its inevitable
distrust of material from "Catholic" sources, represented
a wide area of choice. Its texts, as Julian remarks, are
admirably pure ; even though the editor had the temerity
to add an extra verse to Newman's 'Lead, kindly light'.
But its use to-day is almost entirely restricted to churches
of the most marked Evangelical type.

In fad, just as Hymns A. and M. set the pattern of all the

227

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

hymnals that have been mentioned, so in the long run it
was to drive them almost entirely out of the field and to
garner within itself most of their contents that had been
found by experience to be worth keeping. For this reason,
as well as for lack of space, it seems unnecessary to go into
further details concerning these books, which in any case
were only the most conspicuous and representative among
the vast crowd of hymn-books of every kind in which the
unexampled activity of what may be called the "experi-
mental" period of English hymnal-making found ex-
pression.

228

CHAPTER X

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH
CENTURY

THE close of the nineteenth century saw the success
of Hymns Ancient and Modern at its apogee. It had to a
large extent vanquished its older rivals ; while the
younger rivals that were soon to challenge, without
destroying, its supremacy had not yet appeared upon the
field. It is indeed appropriate that the end of the Victorian
age should be specially associated in English hymnody
with a book so intensely characteristic of that age alike
in its strength and in its weakness as the Revised
Edition with the Supplement of 1889. In its combination
of the sober yet definite Churchmanship of the Traclarians
with the individualistic and somewhat sentimental type
of personal religion that was favoured by Churchmen and
Nonconformists alike in the Viclorian age, it reflected
faithfully the Anglican ethos at a period when the Estab-
lished Church was perhaps a more influential spiritualforce
in the life of the nation than it has ever been. Its music,
or at least the contemporary element in it, was not less
characteristic. Someone has described the music of Elgar,
the supreme English composer of the turn of the century,
as "the sublimation of an Ancient and Modern hymn-tune" :
and there is at least a measure of truth in the epigram.

But already for some time there had been signs that the
maintenance of the book's proud position could not be
taken for granted. The general public might cling to its
favourite, as indeed it largely continues to do to this day.
But in circles less dominated by custom and association a

229

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

more critical spirit was at work. It was not denied that
both the general scheme of the book and much of its con-
tents were excellent. But it was felt no less that it con-
tained a good deal of "dead wood" that had failed to
justify itself in practice. This criticism applied more par-
ticularly to the work of contemporary writers, much of
which bore signs of having been "written to order"
because no suitable material of the kind required was
already in existence. On the other hand, the compilers (it
was objected) had failed to explore thoroughly the sources
of English hymnody : and many hymns that deserved to
be included were absent. In some ways, too, the book had
failed to keep pace with the best religious thought of the
age. Certain aspects of Christianity were over-emphasized ;
while others which were assuming a growing importance
were hardly represented at all. In particular, there seemed
to be little reference to those social aspects of the Christian
message which such great teachers as Maurice, Kingsley
and Westcott had emphasized as against the excessive
individualism of the old-fashioned conception of it.

The music was even more criticized than the words. In
the decades before 1890 creative music in England had
been at a low ebb. But now the "Renaissance of English
music" had begun under the leadership of such gifted and
scholarly musicians as Parry and Stanford : and with it
came a change in the standards of educated musical taste.
Mendelssohn, Spohr and Gounod toppled from their
thrones, and a more austere and intellectual style came to
be preferred. Thus the musical atmosphere that had en-
gendered the Vidlorian hymn-tune had grown stale : and
those who had emancipated themselves from it eyed its
produds askance. Moreover, the classical hymn-melodies
were becoming better known to musicians : and by com-
parison Dykes and Stainer and Barnby seemed to be very
"small beer". This new critical attitude found distin-
guished expression in Robert Bridges's essay, A Practical

230

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Discourse on some Principles of Hymn-singing, which appeared
in 1899. The publication in the same year of his Tattendon
Hymnal, containing "100 hymns with their music, chosen
for a village choir" and designed to "show what sort of a
hymnal might be made on my principles", 317 added
example to precept.

These various considerations would in any case have
led those responsible for Hymns A. and M. to face the
necessity of thoroughly overhauling it at least in time.
The history of the book proves that they had never
claimed finality for their work. But, quite apart from this,
a situation had already arisen that appeared to leave them
no option in the matter. 318 In 1892 a committee of the
Convocation of Canterbury made the formal suggestion
that the next revision at Hymns A. andM. should be under-
taken, not by the Proprietors alone, but by two committees
appointed by the Convocations of Canterbury and York
respectively, acting in consultation with them. The book
was to retain its existing title : but after the revision it
should become the property of the Convocations or of
some body which they approved. The Proprietors very
naturally refused to accept these sweeping suggestions;
though they expressed their willingness to allow their
book to be used in drawing up any hymnal which the
Convocations should put forth by authority. Eventually
the idea of a hymnal authorized by Convocation was
dropped : but the Proprietors felt themselves pledged to
undertake the revision of their book themselves. The work
went on for ten years from 1894 to 1904.

The "New Edition" (as it is called) which made its
appearance in the latter year was in every way a great
advance on the Old. Behind it lay an immense amount of
research, bringing to light a large amount of material that
had hitherto been hidden from view. Some idea of the
learning and scholarship involved in this research may be
gauged from the Historical Edition of Hymns Ancient and

Q, 231

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Modern, which (it should be noted) takes as its text for
commentary the 1904 book and not that generally used.
It was published in 1909; and though issued anony-
mously was the work of Dr. Frere. It is invaluable to all
serious students of hymnody, and its stores have been
freely drawn upon by subsequent compilers of hymnals,
like the 1904 book itself. In the latter many new hymns
and tunes of all periods were included : and the texts of
those that had already appeared were brought much
closer to those of the originals. A considerable, number of
the hymns in the earlier edition were omitted : and in
introducing new material the compilers (among whom
that accomplished scholar and theologian, Dr. A. J.
Mason, was specially prominent) showed themselves con-
siderably more exacting than their predecessors had been.
On the musical side much assistance was received from
[Sir] Charles Stanford (1852-1 924) and Sir Hubert Parry
(1848-1918). Both made several valuable contributions,
some of which have been already mentioned. A feature
of the book was a full complement of the ancient Sarum
Office Hymns for the seasons and most important festivals
with their proper tunes ; while among the melodies intro-
duced for the first time were not a few fine examples by
Bourgeois and Gibbons and some of the best of the English
eighteenth-century tunes which had passed into disuse.
Many of these melodies have achieved wide use and
popularity since.

Unhappily the fortune of the new book was not equal
to its deserts. It was, in facl, a colossal failure : and the
unfortunate Proprietors, in addition to an immense loss of
time and trouble, found themselves saddled with a huge
financial loss as well. The 1904 Hymns A. and M. has never
been permanently taken up anywhere. The great mass of
Churchgoers clung to the book to which they had become
accustomed, and especially resented the idea that they
should provide themselves with substitutes for the hymn-

232

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

books which they already possessed. It was found, too, on
examination that not a few of their "favourites" had been
omitted : and the changing of the familiar numeration
was also very unpopular. To discover that 'Abide with
me' was no longer 'Hymn 27' or 'Jesu, Lover of my soul'
'Hymn 193' was desolating ! In addition, the book had a
thoroughly bad "press" in the more widely read journals.
The most widely read of all leaped in particular on the
compilers' conscientious but not very prudent restoration
of Charles Wesley's own text in line i of 'Hymn 60', 'Hark,
how all the welkin rings'. The public laughed long and
loud : and it is hardly an exaggeration to say that 'the
welkin 5 gave the final death-blow to the 1904 book.

In the face of so disastrous a shipwreck all that could be
done was to gather up the fragments and use them in
another way. Such was the objecl; of the "Second Supple-
ment" appended to the old book in 1916. The obvious
drawback to this expedient was that it meant that the
latter remained in statu quo, burdened with all the inferior
stuff which the compilers had sought to get rid of. But it
was the best that could be done in the circumstances. The
Second Supplement as originally issued was a separate
volume and fell into two sections. The first section added
161 new hymns with accompanying tunes, making 779
in all. The second provided better tunes (mostly old ones)
as alternatives to those in the old book which were felt
to be unworthy of their place. The material in both
parts was largely drawn from the 1904 book: but
there was a good deal of entirely new material as well
both words and music. On its musical side the standard is
particularly high. In addition to many fine melodies
drawn from earlier periods, considerable use was made of
the beautiful and hitherto strangely neglecled tunes by
the eminent Church musician, Samuel Sebastian Wesley
(1810-76), included by him in a collection published in
1872 with the title of The European Psalmist. Several of the

233

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

tunes inserted were settings of hymns by the composer's
grandfather, Charles Wesley.

The original form of the Second Supplement was an
inconvenient arrangement that could obviously only be
temporary. In 1922 it was incorporated with the main
body of the book and the whole collection was reset in a
single volume. The alternative tunes provided for the
sections of 1875 and 1889 were inserted in their proper
places with the hymns to which they belonged : and the
new hymns and tunes added in 1916 were bound in at the
end. This is the "Standard Edition" the sole current
form of Hymns A. and M. But the Second Supplement,
which undeniably adds so much to the worth of the book,
is still strangely neglected in many churches that use it.
It is there ready to hand : but its contents are little known.
It is this situation which may partly explain the curious
persistence with which most critics of Hymns A. and M.
ignore the existence of the Second Supplement and
denounce it as a purely "Viftorian hymn-book" that has
never shown signs of repentance.

Before leaving the subjecl of Hymns A. and M, mention
should be made of a further venture of those responsible
for it the Plainsong Hymn Book, issued in 1932. This con-
tains 164 hymns accompanied by a rather larger number
of plainsong melodies, and including a complete cycle of
representative Sarum Office Hymns. Much of the material
is new, both words and tunes. The latter are specially im-
portant and interesting, and represent the fruits of a life-
time's study and research by the compiler, Dr. Frere. About
half of the tunes had appeared in his Plainsong Hymn
Melodies and Sequences, first published by the Plainsong and
Mediaeval Music Society in 1896 (4th edn. 1920) : the
rest had not been published before. They are of all dates
down to the eighteenth century : and many of them are
culled direct from MSS. in the libraries of England and
the Continent. Like the 1904 Hymns A. and M., the book

234

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

has failed to win the attention and use that it deserves, at
least as yet. But it is, and is likely to remain, by far the
largest and most comprehensive collection of plainsong
hymns available for English Ghurchpeople.

ii

The failure of the 1904 revision was the price paid for
the popularity of the old Hymns A. and M. The great mass
of Ghurchpeople had turned a deaf ear to the criticisms of
the minority and shown that they "hated to be reformed".
But the minority was still there, as were the patent weak-
nesses of Hymns A. and M. in its unreformed state still in
general use. It seemed likely, too, that the future would
lie with the critics rather than with the conservatives. The
twentieth century had arrived : and with it the reaction
against "Vi&orianism" had begun and new ideas were
everywhere in the air. Thus the times were propitious for
the appearance of a new hymn-book that should corre-
spond with the ideals and taste of the new age. Such a
book must expecl: to make its way slowly, in view of the
vis inertiae which always plays so great a part in Church
affairs and had already defeated the revisers of Hymns
A. and M. But it would have influential backing, which
might be relied upon to grow still stronger in process of
time.

Even before the revised Hymns A. and M. made its
appearance a potential candidate had arrived in the
shape of the revised edition of the S.P.G.K. Church Hymns
(1903). Here, too, there was a notable advance both in
the selection of hymns and tunes and in the purity of the
texts. But the book was, after all, only a new form of an
old book which had always been overshadowed by a more
successful rival : and in this and other ways it lacked the
charm of novelty. Moreover, its very moderate tone made

235

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

little appeal to Anglo-Catholics, who were growing
rapidly in numbers and importance and, so far at least as
a large and adive sedion of them was concerned, were
adopting a "progressive" outlook on things in general
very different from the cautious traditionalism of the old
Tradarians and their successors.

It was from this section of the Anglo- Catholics that the
English Hymnal (1906) was to proceed the most for-
midable rival that Hymns A. and M. has as yet had to face.
At the same time its compilers were careful to deny any
propagandist intent. Its preface states expressly that "it is
not a party book . . . but an attempt to combine . . . the
worthiest expressions of all that lies within the Christian
Creed, from those 'ancient Fathers' who were the earliest
hymn- writers down to contemporary exponents of modern
aspirations and ideals". The book is "offered to all broad-
minded men". These disclaimers, however, did not
wholly succeed in carrying convidion in view of the
decidedly "Catholic" tone of many of the contents of the
book, with their high sacramental dodrine and bold
resort to prayers for the dead and even the "invocation of
saints". Certain leading bishops frowned on the English
Hymnal, and even forbade its use in their dioceses.
Objedion was particularly taken to certain appeals for
the intercession of the Blessed Virgin. The difficulty was
solved in 1907 by an "abridged edition" in which 5
hymns were altered and 4 omitted altogether.

If the English Hymnal was and remains too "Catholic"
for many tastes, it is admirably "catholic" in the other
sense of that obliging word. There is a complete set of the
Sarum Office Hymns for the seasons, for the Common of
Saints and for the Proper of the most important individual
saints. Many of the translations of these hymns were
specially made for the book and are a great improvement
on those which had appeared in the earlier Anglo-
Catholic hymnals. Greek hymnody and German con-

236

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

tribute not a few examples, along with the seventeenth
century Latin hymns from the French Breviaries. As
regards hymns of English origin, all periods are well and
worthily represented. To a large extent the selection is
identical with that found in Hymns A. and M. : but the
compilers were free to get rid of most of the inferior
Victorian hymns which still unduly cumber the older
book, and at the same time added a large number of
English hymns of all periods that had not found a place
there. Many of these additions have been already com-
mented on in earlier chapters. They include two classes
that are specially worthy of note. The first of these con-
sists of 10 of the fine versions of Latin and Greek and
German originals made by the late Poet Laureate Robert
Bridges (1844-1930) for the Tattendon Hymnal, together
with 3 more or less original compositions from the same
accomplished hand. The second is a group of hymns of
American origin, some of which have already won wide
and deserved popularity. We may specially mention 'Once
to every man and nation' 1563, an extensively altered
cento (the 5 long lines in each verse of the original are
even reduced to 8 half-lines) of a poem by the distin-
guished American man of letters, James Russell Lowell
(1819-91), written in 1845 in the anti-slavery interest at
the time of the war between the United States and
Mexico ; 'City of GOD, how broad and fair' t375> by
Samuel Johnson (1822-82) ; 'Thy kingdom come ! on
bended knee' 1504 and 'O Thou in all Thy might so far'
[463, by Frederick L. Hosmer (1840-1929) ; 'Lord of all
being, throned afar' 1434? by tne essayist and poet,
Oliver Wendell Holmes (1809-94) ; and 'Jesus, these eyes
have never seen' J42I, by Ray Palmer (1808-87). The
first four of these authors were Unitarians, the last a Con-
gregationalist. Their hymns thus exhibit a broadly
theistic and "non-ecclesiastical" religious outlook which
is no doubt partly the secret of the strong appeal that

237

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

they make to many minds in the present age. In addition,
the first three of the hymns that we have mentioned
emphasize the national and social bearings of the Chris-
tian message that had been inadequately represented in
previous Church hymnals. Three other hymns in E.H.
are notable as having a similar significance : the "Re-
cessional" of Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936), written on
the occasion of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in
1897, 'Goc of our fathers, known of old' J558 ; C O GOD of
earth and altar 5 1562, by Gilbert K. Chesterton (1874-
1936) ; and 'Judge eternal, throned in splendour' 1423,
by the celebrated preacher, Henry Scott Holland (1847-
1918), Canon of St. Paul's and later Regius Professor of
Divinity at Oxford.

The music of the English Hymnal exhibits the same fine
comprehensiveness as the words. On this side the book
had the immense advantage of being under the editorship
of the most distinguished of living English musicians,
Dr. Ralph Vaughan Williams (b. 1872). He himself con-
tributed a number of tunes, of which the now famous
'Sine Nomine' 1641 and the beautiful 'Down Ampney'
f 152 stand in the first rank of modern hymn-tunes. His
share was further increased when the music was revised
in 1933 notably by the stately 'King's Weston' J368,
which had already appeared in Songs of Praise. Other
important contributors were the brothers Martin Shaw
(b. 1876) and Geoffrey Shaw (b. 1879). There was a
splendid garnering of old tunes of all periods, many of
which (it is only fair to say) had already made their
appearance in the 1904 revision of Hymns A. and M. The
Office Hymns were in each case accompanied by their
plainsong melodies, with modern tunes as alternatives.
The former were admirably reset in the 1933 revision by
Mr. J. H. Arnold in accordance with the principles now
generally commended by experts. In regard to tunes of
later date the English Hymnal broke new ground in three

238

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

directions in particular. First, in its inclusion of a number
of the so-called "church melodies" which sprang up in
France in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to pro-
vide settings in measured form in place of the unmeasured
plainsong melodies. These tunes have often a fine sweeping
quality that makes them attractive and popular, though
some of them are liable to be obnoxious to purists as "de-
based" or "bastard" plainsong. The second class of new
material consists of a number of the tunes produced in
Methodist circles in Wales in the nineteenth century ; and
the third of a larger collection of entirely new tunes based
on English secular folk-songs. Both of these have been a
good deal criticized. The Welsh tunes are often very dull :
their form, in particular, is exceedingly monotonous, with
its continual repetition of the same material (of four
sections of each tune three are normally the same) and its
incessant return to the "tonic". The English folk-tunes,
too, though often ^beautiful in themselves, are not always
appropriate to the atmosphere of a church and, reflecting
as they do a "craze" of the period that converted them to
new use, may not prove to wear very well. A further weak-
ness of the English Hymnal on its musical side is its inability
to resist the subtle temptation to present its German
chorales in the elaborately harmonized versions of J. S.
Bach. These are, of course, superb in themselves : but they
were never intended, nor are they in the least suitable,
for use in alliance with hymns containing a considerable
number of verses. Nor is the exceedingly slow tempo
adopted in Germany in singing chorales (under quite
different conditions) consonant with modern English habit
or preference. The arrangement, e.g., of 'Forty days and
forty nights' ^73 would weary any congregation to death.
The compilers would have done well to heed Bridges's
dictum already quoted (p. 101). If any German chorale
is not suitable for use as an English hymn-tune, it should
not be used for the purpose at all.

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

These, however, are but incidental blemishes in a
hymnal which is for the most part admirable both in
words and music. Its obvious excellences were certain to
win for it enthusiastic approval in quarters which cared
seriously about the quality of our Church song : and its
use and popularity have steadily grown, especially in
churches with congregations of the more educated type.
In the early days of its existence, too, its claim to recog-
nition as against the only current form of Hymns A. and M.
was greatly enhanced by the fad: that the latter was still
in its unreformed "Vidorian" state, owing to the com-
plete failure of the 1904 revision. But the publication
of the Second Supplement in 1916 has enormously
strengthened the position of the older hymnal in this
resped. We may add, further, that there are signs at
present of a more critical attitude towards the English
Hymnal among competent musicians than was apparent
at first a tendency to stress its defeds as well as its
qualities. This fad should be borne in mind by those who
are zealous for hymnal reform, but are without much
equipment for forming reliable artistic judgments for
themselves. It is very doubtful, too, whether the musical
revision undertaken in 1933 was in all respeds an im-
provement.

In the enrichment of their book, particularly on its
musical side, the compilers of the English Hymnal were able
to draw not only on the admirable pioneer work of those
responsible for the 1904 revision of Hymns A. and M.> but
also on the extremely valuable colledion published (also
in 1904) by the Rev. G. R. Woodward with the title Songs
of Syon. The music and the words were at first issued
separately. The former was described by the editor as
representing "an honest endeavour to raise the standard
of English taste, by rescuing from oblivion some of the
finest melodies of the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries". These were "presented in their primitive in-

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NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

tegrity and, where possible, with the original harmony".
The accompanying words edition was described on the
title page as "a collection of hymns and sacred poems
mostly translated from ancient Greek, Latin and German
sources". It was designed to furnish words to fit the melo-
dies provided, most of which were in unusual metres, and
so to make it possible to use them. It included some 50
examples from the accomplished hand of the editor him-
self both translations (from all three languages) and
original compositions. Woodward, like his greatly
admired Neale, had a curiously mediaeval cast of mind,
but with a lighter literary touch and a charming quaint-
ness of language and fancy that borders at times on the
fantastic a quality even more evident in the carols that
he translated or wrote for the Cowley Carol Book and other
collections edited by him. "Compiled" (as its preface is
careful to point out) "for the faithful", not for "the
inquirers after truth", Songs of Syon was further "intended
not to compete with existing hymnals but only to supple-
ment them". It thus made no claim to be a complete
hymn-book in itself: its importance lies in its value
as a source-book. Four years later (in 1908) another col-
lection of admirable literary and musical quality but with
a similarly limited appeal was issued as the Oxford Hymn
Book under the joint editorship of Dr. T. B. Strong, then
Dean of Christ Church, and Dr. Basil Harwood. Its pre-
face expressly disclaims any intention to provide a com-
pletely comprehensive hymn-book : the book seeks rather
to "make a more restricted selection of those hymns which
appear to satisfy a certain standard and to be content
with a more approximate application of them to particular

occasions".

The hymnals that have been spoken of hitherto were
all definitely Church books intended for use by Church-
people. The other Christian denominations had their own
books, framed to meet their own needs and points of view.

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Until recently this principle, "To every Christian body its
own hymn-book," was taken for granted. But after the
Great War the circumstances seemed propitious to the
success of a book that should transcend denominational
differences and appeal to all English-speaking Christians.
The war had done much to familiarize men's minds with
the idea of an undogmatic, unseclarian Christianity,
which was already the theoretic basis of the religious
instruction given in the State-provided schools, and which
in the post-war years was to find expression in Brother-
hoods, Guilds and similar gatherings. Moreover, hymn-
books were urgently needed for the schools, secondary and
higher elementary, that were developing so rapidly all
over the country : and these hymn-books, like the schools
themselves, must be free from denominational bias. The
tendency to transcend sectarian differences found an echo
within the Church of England itself in an active and influ-
ential section which was "Modernist" in its outlook and,
as such, inclined to sit lightly to the dogmatic affirmations
of traditional Christianity. Christianity, it was urged, is
not a body of theological beliefs, but an attitude of mind
and heart that seeks to mould the life not only of the
individual but of the nation and of human society as a
whole in accordance with the spirit of Jesus Christ. In
allegiance to that spirit all men of goodwill may be one,
not only the members of all the Christian denominations
but even those who are unable to accept ex animo the
historic Creeds of the Church.

Such, roughly speaking, were the ideas that inspired the
production of Songs of Praise, the most important addition
to the long list of English hymn-books since the English
Hymnal, and one that strikes out an entirely new line. It is
not a Church hymn-book, but is designed for use by
Christians of all denominations and even (at least in a
great part of it) by those who would hesitate to call them-
selves Christians at all. Its preface expressly claims for it

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NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

a "national" character and suitability not for public
worship only but also "for schools, leclure meetings and
other public gatherings".

Its editor, Dr. Percy Dearmer (1867-1936), had played
a leading part in the compilation of the Anglo- Catholic
English Hymnal some twenty years before. But in the
interval his religious position had undergone a marked
change. His Anglo-Catholicism had always been of the
liberal and progressive sort, with a strong admixture of
Christian Socialism. But now he had ceased to be an
Anglo-Catholic altogether and ranked as a Modernist of
an advanced type. A man of great ability and capacity for
work, with a wide and cultivated knowledge of both
literature and art, and at the same time singularly sensi-
tive to every current of contemporary "progressive"
thought, he was eminently fitted for editing a hymn-book
on the lines which he proposed. Not only did he edit Songs
of Praise but he also embarked on a campaign in its behalf
which erred if at all on the side of excessive zeal. The book
received a warm welcome from educational authorities in
many parts of the country : and it was also taken up with
enthusiasm by the authorities of the great new cathedral
at Liverpool, who were entirely in sympathy with the
ideals that inspired it.

Even those who do not share that sympathy will be
forced to admit that Songs of Praise is a remarkable achieve-
ment and one likely to have a powerful influence on the
English hymnody of the future. It has made available
many fine specimens of English religious poetry of all
periods that had not hitherto found a place in our hymn-
books with a special stress (as we might anticipate) on
that element of "social service" which had already figured
to some extent in the English Hymnal and had done much
to commend that book to many who had little sympathy
with it on its Anglo- Catholic side. In regard to many of
these additions it may be doubted whether they are really

243

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

suited for use as hymns. The editor has not always borne in
mind the distinction between a hymn and a religious
poem. Some of them, too, would seem to be pantheistic
rather than Christian in outlook. But we must bear in
mind the public for which the book is primarily intended
a public very different from the congregation of the
ordinary parish church. Nor can it be denied that not a
few of these poems do make admirable hymns, of which
all future compilers of hymn-books will be forced to take
notice. A number of these have been already mentioned
in previous chapters of this book. On the musical side, too,
Songs of Praise has introduced a good deal of valuable
material retrieved from the past, in addition to much that
had already figured in the English Hymnal and the Second
Supplement of Hymns A. and M. Some, however, will be
of opinion that, as in the case of the former of these books,
an unduly large place has been given to Welsh Methodist
tunes and to tunes adapted from English folk-songs, as
well as to the often rather banal and vulgar products of
English Methodism in the late eighteenth and early nine-
teenth centuries. On the other hand, the "Victorian"
hymn-tune (in regard to which Dr. Dearmer entertained
a prejudice which almost amounted to an obsession) is as
far as possible eliminated altogether.

In addition to these "new-old" elements Songs of Praise
also includes a large amount of entirely new material,
both words and music, the work of contemporary writers
and musicians. Among the former a prominent place is
held by Dr. Dearmer himself, who, like other hymnal com-
pilers before him, does not seem to have been always
sufficiently on his guard against the very human prejudice
of an author in favour of his own work. Some, too, of
the classic hymns of Christendom are more or less recast
in order to bring them into line with the "Modernist"
standpoint. A noteworthy feature of the book is the
"Proper of Saints" section, in which a gallant if not

244

NEW IDEAS IN THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

altogether successful attempt is made to solve a standing
problem by providing a series of hyrnns which are mostly
new compositions specially written by various writers.
Among the composers of new tunes the two musical
editors, Dr. Vaughan Williams and Dr. Martin Shaw,
stand out conspicuous. It should be added that the book
was enlarged and completely recast in 1931, when much
new material was introduced and the total number of its
contents was raised from 467 to 703.

The scope and purpose of Songs of Praise set it (stricHy
speaking) outside the limits of this book : but, as it has
already achieved a fair currency in Anglican churches
and is certain to have much influence in the future on
Anglican hymnals .proper, it has been thought necessary
to say something about it. On the question of its merits
and defects the present writer would prefer to add nothing
to the little that he has already said. It is admittedly an
experimental book, novel in its plan, challenging in its
outlook and containing much entirely new and untried
material. As to the value of this last for its purpose only
posterity can judge : and no attempt is made here to don
the prophet's mantle and anticipate the verdict. The book
is as completely typical of the age which produced it as
was the Victorian version of Hymns A. and M. : and no
doubt in due course of time it will have to encounter pre-
cisely the same sharp fire of criticism to which its cham-
pions have subjected the older book. We may safely affirm,
however, that both books contain much that will prove to
be of permanent value ; and that each will be regarded a
century hence as epoch-making in its own way.

245

PART II
PRACTICAL

CHAPTER XI
TOWARDS A POLICY

SO far as individual hymns are concerned, the account
given in the preceding chapters of Christian hymnody
throughout the ages has been mainly confined to
those permanently valuable products of every age which
have become available for the use of English Christians in
our own, either in their (more or less) original form or in
translations. A complete account of the whole output of
hymn-writing since the Church began is impossible : and
even if it were possible it would not be worth attempting.
Dr. Bridges has spoken of "thatt most depressing of all
books ever compiled by the groaning creatur, Julian's
hymn-dictionary". 319 This judgment is not very
graciously expressed : for Julian's great work is a monu-
ment of learning and research and is indispensable to
every student. But it is certainly "depressing" in the sense
which Bridges, of course, intended that it contains
notices of innumerable hymns which few students re-
member or want to remember, and more particularly of
hymns that had a transient currency in the less educated
religious circles of England and America in the second
half of the nineteenth century. Even so it only deals with
a fraction of what might have figured in its pages. Time,
on the whole, is a sound critic in hymnody as in other
matters : those hymns survive that deserve to survive. The
vogue of the moment is an extremely unsafe guide : but if
a hymn can still win love and admiration after several
centuries and can even surmount (as in many cases) the
serious handicap of translation, we may be fairly certain

249

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

that there is something about it worth keeping. Nor will
a critical literary sense usually find much ground for
serious quarrel with this verdicl, if the limitations of what
constitutes a hymn are borne in mind. It seems fair to say
that at least the great majority of the hymns mentioned in
the preceding pages can make a good claim to inclusion
in any hymnal that purports to represent the best that
Christian hymnody has bequeathed to us.

Starting from this basis and even applying a rigorous
criticism to the material at our disposal, we should have a
body of hymns of fairly imposing dimensions and one
quite sufficient in itself to satisfy all reasonable require-
ments of the ordinary church. The only sedion inade-
quately provided for would be the "Proper of Saints" :
but we do not really need hymns about such shadowy
figures as St. Bartholomew or Saint Simon and Saint Jude,
which even the most accomplished poet could hardly hope
to make very inspiring. Is there, then, any real necessity
to go beyond such a "classical" collection as would be
forthcoming on these terms of entrance ?

The question raises issues of very practical importance.
The average sort of congregation is mainly composed of
the average sort of people, who have a very human objec-
tion to having things that they dislike thrust down their
throats because somebody else thinks that they ought to
like them. The diclum that "men must love the highest
when they see it" does not, unfortunately, always hold
good in pradice. For instance, the Tattendon Hymnal is a
casket of jewels : but there are good grounds for believing
that Yattendon itself did not think very highly of it. Of
the hymns in our suggested "classical" collection a con-
siderable proportion have become established popular
favourites : but many others appeal to the few rather than
the many, and even the most determined efforts to
popularize them seem hardly able to win for them any-
thing more than toleration. On the other hand, congrega-

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TOWARDS A POLICY

tions have a trying habit of manifesting a special liking
for hymns that a refined literary or musical taste con-
demns. Take, for example, hymns of what is called the
"mission" type. Such hymns have always been more
popular among Nonconformists than in the Church of
England : and the policy of the compilers of Church
hymnals has usually been to include as few of them as
possible. Yet if for any reason a hymn of this kind is intro-
duced into the service of a church with a working-class
congregation, the people will almost certainly "take to"
it and demand its repetition. How far is this taste to be
yielded to ? It cannot be denied that to simple and un-
educated minds such hymns make a great appeal : and
the great revivalists of the past have had no hesitation in
using them and have largely promoted the success of their
work by doing so. The crude language and metaphors and
floridly vulgar tunes of many early Methodist hymns, the
sentimental catchiness of "Moody and Sankey", the
adaptation to pious words of popular tunes of the moment
by the Salvation Army all these were an integral and
deliberate part of the evangelism of those who adopted
them. Nor can it be denied that all these movements did
much good in a social milieu to which the standards of
literary and musical criticism meant nothing at all. In the
great work of saving souls questions of artistic taste are of
secondary importance. The present writer remembers
being struck by a remark made by the organist of a church
famous for its exquisite musical services, to the effecT: that
if he could fill an empty church and keep it full by using
music that he knew to be artistically worthless he would
not hesitate to do so.

The hymns of which we are speaking are, of course, an
extreme case : but for that very reason they pose our
problem in its most clear-cut and challenging form. The
same problem, however, is raised less acutely by not a few
hymns which (unlike these) figure prominently in our

251

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

popular Church hymnals. In confronting it we may begin
by setting down certain salient fads that need to be borne
in mind.

1 . The bulk of the public that we have to cater for
judges much more by the tune than by the words. The
vast crowd which sings 'Abide with me' before a Cup
Final football match is not thinking at all about the words,
which are as unsuitable as they could possibly be both to
the occasion and to the sort of people who sing them. But
they know and like the tune, which serves as an outlet to
their pent-up excitement. In the same way, when a con-
gregation sings a hymn in church with gusto it is the tune
that bears them along. Many of them have only a vague
general idea as to what their favourite hymns are
about.

2. The explanation would appear to lie in the faft that
for the ordinary man music has a wider range of expres-
sion than has language. The same phenomenon is visible
in the case of the "theme-songs" that are heard at the
cinema. The words of these are the most arrant rubbish :
and no one pays heed to anything except their general
sense. It is the tune that creates the required mood and
atmosphere : and this is all that matters for the purpose in
view.

3. In regard to words and music alike, only a small pro-
portion of the public has enough of educated taste to
judge whether a thing is good or bad. People will say that
"they know what they like", but can give no better or
clearer reason for their preference. Sometimes their judg-
ment will coincide with that of the educated critic ; more
often it is the exad opposite. We may add that, where
hymns are concerned, the majority have often not enough
of religious experience to enable them to enter into the
emotion which prompted the author to write his hymn.
The almost agonized sense of the dependence of the human
soul upon GOD that inspired 'Abide with me' was very

252

TOWARDS A POLICY

real to Henry Francis Lyte : it means little to many who
enjoy singing his hymn in church or elsewhere.

4. In the formation of popular judgments on hymns
association is a much more powerful fador than intrinsic
value. This applies not only to the uneducated but to the
educated as well, if we may judge from the hymns sung
at the funerals of famous and greatly gifted men as their
"favourites". Here we face what is perhaps the most
fundamental consideration of all. It is not so much what
a hymn is or says that counts, as what it means to the
individual who sings or hears it. Most of us will admit that
there are some hymns and tunes which we are quite unable
to look at from an external or objective point of view.
Viewed through the golden mist of memory and associ-
ation, even poor verse and undignified rhythm and
melody may wear an entirely different look.

These, it must be repeated, are simple psychological
facts : and in deciding what hymns we are to use we can
only ignore them at the cost of alienating a large part pf
our congregations. The cultivated critic may rail as much
as he likes against the preference of the ordinary wor-
shipper in favour of the "Vidorian" sentimental hymns
and tunes : but he will neither be able to make him appre-
ciate his own criteria of taste nor wipe out the associations
that make such things dear. All he can do is to create new
and better associations and to trust that the old associa-
tions will disappear with the lapse of time. Meanwhile, he
may console himself by reflecting that, after all, the things
which he dislikes so much are doing no great harm. It is
sometimes alleged that the use of sentimental hymns and
tunes is enervating, and calculated to sap the moral fibre
of those who sing them. But this argument is hardly borne
out by the fads. It is curious but undeniable that the most
virile types of men sailors, soldiers, miners and the like
show a special liking for just these sentimental hymns.
Such men feel more deeply than they are usually willing

253

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

to show : and, being for the most part simple, unsophisti-
cated souls, they do not make a very clear distinction
between sentiment and sentimentality. The present move-
ment in favour of "stark" and "rugged" hymns proceeds
from a cultivated artistic circle which is rather out of
touch with the workaday world of the common man. The
ordinary Englishman is decidedly a Philistine ; and seems
likely to remain so in spite of all efforts to make him other-
wise. In religion as in other matters he likes to express his
emotions in ways that seem rather crude to a cultivated
taste. We must take him as we find him : and if when he
goes to church he prefers hymns like 'Abide with me' or
'Hark, hark my soul' to German chorales or a combina-
tion of Bridges and Bourgeois, we must not refuse him a
measure of what he likes nor bolster up our refusal by
pretending that such hymns make him "less of a man",
when actually he is often more of a man than his better-
educated critics. A church, after all, is a place to help the
wayfaring man or woman along the rough road of life, not
an academy of the fine arts. We are right to say that we
must only offer our best to GOD : but we have no reason
for supposing that GOD'S idea of "the best" is purely or
even primarily aesthetic. A poor hymn which means some-
thing, however dimly felt, to those who sing it is more
acceptable to Him than the choicest poetry and music
listened to with coldness and boredom. The reader may
remember the poignant scene in a modern novel where a
number of miners entombed in a pit sing 'Hold the fort,'
and the author's comment : "Each and all realized that
there are worse ways of going to one's death than singing
a battle song by Moody and Sankey." 32

Again, even in the matter of criteria of taste, it should
not be forgotten that the literary and musical preferences
of the cultivated minority at any given moment are far
from representing a standard that is unalterably fixed.
Fashions change : and the present taste for a stark and

254

TOWARDS A POLICY

unsentimental directness is a natural reaction from the
rhetoric and romanticism of the late nineteenth century.
But we cannot be certain that the reaction will continue :
and there is real danger lest, when we set to work to purge
our hymnals, we "tip out the baby with the bath- water".
The characteristic products of Victorian hymnody are
probably neither as good as the Victorians thought them
nor as bad as their critics of to-day think them. Time will
winnow them out, as it has winnowed out the hymns of
earlier ages. The great majority will become obsolete : but
the best will remain and will be valued as typical of their
age and style and also as most characteristically
English. Do not these hymns, after all, represent practi-
cally the only, approach to a genuine "folk-song" that the
present age can show ? Meanwhile we must be prepared
for the "time-lag" which always dictates that the less
worthy products of the preceding generation, which a
critical judgment rightly rejects, shall retain their hold for
the time being on the uncritical multitude. The inferior
specimens among the "Georgian" hymns now being pro-
duced are likely to be just as much a nuisance to the
musical reformers of fifty years hence as the bad "Vic-
torian" hymns are to those of to-day.

What, then, is to be our practical line of action ?
Certainly not to adopt a policy of drift and to abandon all
efforts to improve the standard of our Church song. But
it is no use to force the pace : we must proceed slowly. To
begin with, we should remember that our attitude must
be largely determined by the kind of church (and also the
kind of service) for which provision has to be made. Much
may be permitted in a mission church in a slum district
that could not be tolerated for a moment in a church with
an educated congregation. Then (bearing this distinction
in mind) we must make it our business to put on our hymn
lists as many good hymns as we dare; and no more in-
ferior hymns than we must in order to keep our congrega-

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

tions content. Above all, we must be careful to see that the
new hymns which we introduce into our services are such
as reach an adequate standard both in words and music,
unless there be urgent religious reasons to the contrary.
We may sometimes have to make concessions to popular
taste : but we need not deliberately encourage it to be bad.
Fortunately, a large number of popular hymns are also
unexceptionable from the critic's standpoint : and this
eases our problem considerably. A sound practical rule
for those who have to choose hymns would seem to be
this. In the case of hymns sung within the framework of
the Divine Office itself (whether as "Office Hymn" before
the Psalms or Magnificat, or as a substitute for the
"Anthem" after the Third Collect) choose only hymns
that are first-rate, with a special preference for hymns of
the "objective" type, concerned with the glory and
majesty of GOD and the great mysteries of the Faith rather
than with the subjective moods and needs of the indi-
vidual. The more "popular" and subjective hymns can
be sung later, before or after the sermon, which is ex-
peeled to deal largely with the more personal aspects of
religion. At the Eucharist, too, the hymns chosen should
be of the more objective and dignified type, in so far
as they are not Eucharistic hymns. The latter will
supply as much of the subjective element as is needful or
desirable.

The same policy should be followed by those who have
not simply to use hymnals but to compile or revise them ;
unless, of course, they are in the lucky and exceptional
position of having to provide (like the compilers of the
Oxford Hymn Book) for an educated and critical clientele
only. Broadly speaking, we may say that hymns serve two
purposes, and that a popular hymnal should be designed
to meet them both. The first purpose may be described as
"liturgical" the adornment of the Church's worship
with the best that is available and suitable in poetry and

256

TOWARDS A POLICY

in art. The provision here should be confined to the
classical products of every age, with a special preference
for hymns that have stood the test of centuries. Such
modern hymns as are included under this category should
bear unmistakable signs of being of the highest order. In
cases where the tunes to which the hymns in this class are
usually sung are unworthy of the words, they should be
reset to better tunes here again preferably good old
tunes, or, if modern tunes are used, those that are in-
dubitably first-rate in the judgment of the musicians. The
second purpose we may describe as "popular and mis-
sionary", aiming at the edification of the masses, not
forgetting that the "masses" include many groups of
individuals with special needs of their own. Here the com-
piler may allow himself more latitude, deliberately appeal-
ing to the taste of the age and remembering that each
generation has its own way of envisaging religion and its
own popular preferences in regard to its expression. Of
course, there is a level below which even hymns in this
class should not be allowed to sink : but the line must be
drawn in such a way as to make a reasonable concession
to the popular taste of the time. If hymns of a definitely
"mission" type are used at all (and even the English
Hymnal found it desirable to include such things as 'Hold
the fort' and 'I hear Thy welcome voice'), they should be
relegated to a separate sedion and not be mixed up with
hymns less open to criticism.

All this means that a final and definitive hymnal is an
impossibility. Hymnals are like most other human things
"they have their day and cease to be". For one thing, the
"canon" of Christian hymnody is never closed. The out-
put of hymns, good, bad and indifferent, goes on steadily :
every age has its own contributions to make, and the best
of them go in the end to swell the "classical" stock. The
rest serve their turn for the time being, and then dis-
appear. Many hymns will have a real value for the genera-

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HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

tion that produced them (and for the generation or two
immediately following) which they will not retain for
posterity. This, for example, has been the fate of the great
majority of Charles Wesley's hymns. Written to serve an
immediate need, they served it with acceptance : but the
religious atmosphere which they reflect is different from
that of our day, and they have lost their power to stir men's
hearts. Thus every age has the task of scrapping a large
amount of material that has gone out of date : and every
hymnal must look forward to being supplanted in the end
or at least to undergoing drastic revision.

Once again, in a comprehensive church like our own,
different schools of thought have their particular prefer-
ences in hymns as elsewhere. The historic associations and
the dogmatic content of the mediaeval Office Hymns and
of many of the Traclarian hymns will make an appeal to
the Anglo-Catholic which the Evangelical and still more
the Modernist will be far from recognizing to the same
extent. The Evangelical, on the other hand, has always
shown a special preference for the "personal" type of
hymn ; while the Modernist, with his distrust of doclrinal
definition and desire to make the Church as compre-
hensive as possible, will be ready to admit into the hymnal
he uses a number of religious lyrics which those who set
more store by the traditional theology will regard as
theistic rather than specifically Christian. These different
schools of thought have all their recognized place within
the corporate framework of Anglicanism : and as no single
hymnal can give to all alike the hymns that each wants to
use and no others, it is only natural that each should have
a hymnal or hymnals of its own. This multiplication of
hymnals has the further advantage of encouraging a wider
range of research and experiment along different lines.
For example, even those who do not entirely approve of
Songs of Praise will admit that it is introducing and
popularizing a considerable number of hymns that are

258

TOWARDS A POLICY

likely to prove permanent additions to the "classical"
hymnody of the future.

The desirability of this multiplication of hymn-books,
with the confusion and competition that it inevitably
brings in its train, has of course decidedly its limits. In the
"experimental" period of the second half of the nineteenth
century much practical inconvenience must have been
caused by there being so many rival hymn-books in the
field : and we can only rejoice that the range of choice has
narrowed to-day. On the other hand, if the arguments
adduced in this chapter hold good, it seems well to abstain
from any attempts to stereotype our hymnody. A desire is
sometimes expressed though less frequently than a
generation ago that the Church of England might have
an "official" hymn-book issued by authority for use in
every church. But the case against this seems to be much
stronger than the case in its favour. Such a book would be
difficult to compile, more difficult to enforce in general
use, and most difficult of all to change when once it was
compiled and adopted. Yet there can be no life without
change : and the Church must be ready to march with the
times, in its hymnody as in other more important matters.

2 59

CHAPTER XII
SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

I. THE CHOICE OF HYMNS

i . Who should choose the hymns to be sung in church ?
The parson or the organist ? In practice it is sometimes
the one and sometimes the other. But it is indubitably the
parson's right to do so : and if the organist does so instead
it can only be as the parson's deputy. Not only is it the
parson's right but it is also his duty. It is he who is re-
sponsible for the services of which the hymns form a part :
and it is for him to judge what is necessary to make these
services as appropriate and as helpful as possible. More-
over, as he has the task of preaching as well, he will often
have to choose hymns that may serve either to prepare
his hearers for his discourse beforehand or to drive home
its message afterwards. On the other hand, it can hardly
be too much insisted on that the parson should take the
organist into his confidence and assure himself of his co-
operation and approval. If he is ignorant of music he
should ask the organist's advice on the subject of tunes,
supposing that the organist is competent to give it, which
(of course) is by no means always the case. In the latter
contingency he should seek the advice of those who are
competent. In this connection both parson and organist
will do well to lay to heart the findings of the admirable
Report of the Archbishops' Committee on Church Music
(revised edn. 1932), and especially the four criteria of a
"good tune" laid down on pp. 7-9 and the remarks on
hymn-singing on pp. 29 ff. In this way (granted a reason-
able docility in both towards expert opinion) a common

260

SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

ground may be achieved which will help to reconcile
possible differences of view. In any case, the parson must
take all possible pains to carry his organist with him. If he
is an enthusiast for hymnal reform, he must learn to
temper 2eal with prudence, and remember that unless he
can avoid alienating the organist and the choir his
efforts are likely to do more harm than good. Tact and
patience are nowhere more needed than in the difficult
task of improving our Church music.

2. In choosing the hymns the parson must be willing
to take trouble. In too many cases the job is done in a
hurry. The vicar (or the curate) dashes into the vestry
five minutes before the choir-practice, seizes a hymn-book,
and rapidly turning over its pages chooses the first hymns
catching his eye which "they know" and which have not
been used (so far as his memory serves) on the last few
Sundays. It is obviously impossible to do justice to the
contents of any hymnal in this way, A certain number of
hymns get worked to death ; while many other and better
ones remain entirely unused, less by deliberate intent than
from sheer forgetfulness that they exist. The duty of
choosing hymns (surely not the most insignificant item in
a parson's work) should be set about in a systematic way.
On a day when he has a little time at his disposal, the
parson should take down his hymn-book and make a list
of all the hymns in it that are of a quality to make them
worth singing on their merits, together with those hymns
which, though he knows them to be poor stuff, must be
sung at reasonable intervals because "the congregation
likes them ". Using this first list as a basis he should make
another list from time to time (say once a quarter), in
which he should distribute over the coming Sundays
(a) those hymns appropriate to the season which the
congregation knows, (b) those which they don't know but
would do well to learn, being careful to avoid repetitions
unless he definitely feels them for any reason to be

261

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

desirable. Of course it is well not to put in more than a
very few new hymns at a time, and also to allow the con-
gregation to sing them at frequent intervals at first, so that
it may get to know them. In compiling such a list he will
do well to consult the list of suggested hymns for the
different Sundays, etc., which some hymnals (e.g. E.H.
and S.P.) provide, or the list issued periodically by the
quarterly magazine of the School of English Church
Music. The list which he has thus drawn up will serve as
a basis for the lists that he makes for the several Sundays
as they come, of course making such alterations as may be
necessitated by the circumstances of the moment or by the
subject of his sermon.

3. On the questions concerning (i) the extent to which
the parson may give his people the hymns that they like,
though he knows them to be intrinsically unworthy, and
(2) the assignment of different kinds and qualities of
hymns to different parts of the service, the reader is re-
ferred to what was said in the preceding chapter (p. 250 f.) .
Most congregations like plenty of hymns : and this prefer-
ence where it exists may be freely indulged. From a
liturgical point of view, however, the common pradice of
singing what are called "processional" and "recessional"
hymns i.e. hymns sung while the choir walks to the
chancel and back again is decidedly open to objection ;
though where it rests on long-established usage it may be
perilous to abolish it precipitately. In the case of the so-
called "processional" hymn in particular it is obviously
rather absurd for the priest to say "O Lord, open thou
our lips" in the opening sedion of the service, when the
choir and congregation rjave already joined lustily in a
hymn. Up to that point the service should be kept as
quiet and sotto voce as possible, all being said and not sung.
If a "processional hymn" is sung, it should be on festal
occasions (or in Rogationtide) and in the proper way,
i.e. from the chancel and back to the chancel at the

262

SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

Eucharist before the service and at Evensong at the end
of it before the final Blessing. Where an additional hymn
is required besides those at the usual and obvious points, it
may be inserted at the Eucharist between the Epistle and
Gospel the place occupied by the mediaeval Sequences
and at Evensong either before the Psalms or (the more
usual place) before Magnificat, by analogy with the
Breviary Office Hymns. The use of a "Vesper Hymn" at
the end of evening service need not be too seriously
opposed, if the congregation are accustomed to it and like
it. It is rather sentimental in effect: but simple people
often find it helpful. Care should be taken, however, in
its selection ; as some of the most dreadful specimens of
hymnody are to be found in this category. It should be
sung, too, before the Blessing and not after it: and the
same rule applies to the singing of the National Anthem.
The Blessing is obviously the end of the service.

II. CONGREGATIONAL HYMN-PRACTICES

[Inasmuch as the author has had no great experience
of taking charge of these, he has invoked the help of his
friend and colleague, Dr. Sydney H. Nicholson, who has
kindly contributed the following :]

Congregational practices are certainly desirable; in-
deed without them it is almost impossible to effect im-
provement or to learn new music.

The best time for congregational practices will depend
upon local conditions, but normally they should last about
20 to 30 minutes, either before or after a service.

It is a great advantage to have a more or less informal
"congregational choir", which can be relied on to attend
regularly and to make a habit of looking up the hymns
before coming to church to be, as it were, the re-
sponsible leaders. For this purpose the services of women
singers will prove invaluable, as the main object is to get
a clearly defined line of melody.
s 263

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Theoretically it is best that the congregation should
sing only the melody in unison, but in practice it is im-
possible to prevent those who will from "putting in a bit
of tenor or bass" or "singing seconds". Curiously enough
the effect of this "natural harmony" is not so bad as might
be supposed : in any case it is inevitable, and must be
accepted as such. It is indeed almost true to say that pro-
vided every one sings with enthusiasm it does not very
much matter (apart from the tone-deaf) what he sings !

Thus only the broadest effects are within reach in most
churches. Anything that requires a lot of instruction (like
correct part-singing) is normally out of the question.

But there are certain things that can be done :

(1) The congregation can be taught to start with the
choir, and not to be content to join in about the second
line. Playing over the tune should be the signal for all to
stand.

(2) They can be taught to take deep breaths, so that
the voice will be under control and phrases need not be
broken. A proper supply of breath is the first essential for
singing. Most untutored singers do not take breath con-
sciously at all it is just left to instinct.

(3) They can be taught to give the natural speech-
emphasis to the words. This means concentrating on the
words uttered and defining the vowels and consonants :
very often the words are taken as a mere vehicle to carry
an attractive tune. It is most salutary to read the words
aloud, pointing out (perhaps with a movement of the
hand) where the main stresses fall. This may perhaps be
illustrated by taking two stanzas of Bishop Ken's Evening
Hymn.

More often than not a congregation will sing this either
with equal emphasis on each note whether the syllable is
strong or weak, or with a regular alternation of strong and
weak notes in each line. But if the words are properly
read it will be seen that this regular alternation of strong

264

SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

and weak really only fits one line (the fourth) in the first
verse.

In line i the stress falls on the first syllable of "Glory",
not the second.

In line 2 there are only three stressed syllables : "all",
"bless(mgs)" and "light".

In line 3 the stress is on the first syllable "Keep", not on

"me".

So the verse should be accented thus :

Glory to Thee, my God, this night
For all the blessings of the light :
Keep me, O keep me, King of kings.
Beneath Thy own Almighty wings.

In the third verse another simple point emerges :
Breath must not be taken at the end of lines i and 3,

but they must be joined to lines 2 and 4 respectively.

Thus :

Teach me to live,* that f may dread
The grave as little as my bed ;
Teach me to die,* that so I may
Rise glorious at the awful day.

If a few simple principles like this can be explained to a
congregation, it will make a wonderful difference in the
vitality of the singing. For they cannot be carried out
unless people are thinking of the words they are uttering :
and that is the first necessity for interpretation and
expression of meaning.

(4) Warning should be given about the importance of
maintaining the rhythm or "swing" of a tune once it has
become established. Much depends upon a suitable time
being taken by the choir and organ, but no general rule
can be laid down, for the "right pace" varies with different
conditions.

265

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

(5) Variety can be secured by such simple means as the
use of men's and women's voices in alternation, choir
alone, congregation alone, unison with organ, or unison
softly and without organ. This last is one of the most
impressive in effect, yet is seldom used.

(6) In teaching new tunes it is best to take the melody
line by line without the words, and if the conductor can
give a pattern with his voice it will be better than relying
on the organ. Indeed, much of a congregational practice
should be taken without any instrument.

(7) It is useful if the choir can be present at a congre-
gational practice, but it is wise, at any rate sometimes, to
place them among the congregation not in one block,
but distributed. A very good plan is for the members of
the choir to stand in the aisles, one at the end of each row
of seats, just as though they were in procession. This will
give great confidence to the congregation and at the same
time place responsibility on the individual members of
the choir.

The above are a few methods that have been found
useful in practical experience.

III. CHILDREN'S HYMNS

i. It is only comparatively recently that sufficient
attention has been paid to child-psychology to ensure
that hymns written for children shall be also suitable for
children. The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries
expecled children to be religious in the same way in
which they were dressed like little "grown-ups". The
Divine and Moral Songs for Children of good Dr. Watts enjoy
an unenviable notoriety for their failure to understand a
child's mentality, their perpetual harping on the im-
proving "moral" and their indifference to the possible
effecT: on tender minds of their grim and threatening
presentation of the religion of Jesus Christ. Dr. Dearmer

266

SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

(who himself possessed a quite admirable gift for dealing
with children) has given us some painful examples in his
Songs of Praise Discussed.^ 21 The Hymns for Children of
Charles Wesley reveal some of the same defects indeed
he seems to have deliberately avoided writing for children
as children. 322 Even in the middle of the nineteenth
century the gracious authoress of 'There is a green hill'
and 'All things bright and beautiful' was also capable of
perpetrating 'Within the churchyard, side by side'. Nowa-
days, however, all is changed : and the children of the
present have small grounds in this respect for complaint
concerning the hymns that they are normally expected to
sing.

2. How far should the hymns given to children be con-
fined to those that presuppose children as the singers ?
For various reasons it seems desirable that they should be
encouraged to sing hymns written for general use as well,
so long as these are suitable to their needs and simple
enough for them to understand. The child looks forward
to the day when he will be grown up : and it is good to
encourage this feeling and not to harden him in a
"childish" mentality. Again, the children's service and
the Sunday School are designed as a training for the
corporate worship of later life : and the children as they
grow up will be more at home in this if they are familiar
with the hymns. It may be added that even "children's
hymns" should be to some extent "graded", just as the
children themselves are graded. All children's hymns are
not equally suitable for all children. It is unkind to ask
big boys and girls of fourteen to describe themselves as
"little children". Nor should hymns for the young insist
only on the "meek and gentle" side of the Christian
character, but on its high-spirited and heroic aspect as
well. All these principles are well exemplified in the
Church and School Hymn Book published by S.P.C.K., which
is also excellent both in words and music. Such hymns as

267

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Canon Crum's 'Let us sing to Him who gave us mirth and
laughter' (288) and Mr. Erskine Clarke's 'O, David was a
shepherd lad' (243) in this, and Dean Beeching's little
poem, 'Goo who created me 5 (504), in S.P., represent a
type of hymn of which those who have to deal with grow-
ing boys will wish that there were more examples.

3. In choosing hymns for children we must be very
careful about quality, Nothing is more fatally wrong than
to say, "It is only for children : it doesn't matter whether
the hymn is rubbish or not". Such an attitude is "poison-
ing the wells" with a vengeance ! The taste of the young
is malleable as that of adults is not : it is "wax to receive",
even as it is "marble to retain". Herein lies our chief hope
for raising the standard of Christian hymnody, both by
creating a liking for good things and, even more, by form-
ing new "associations" for good hymns in place of the old
associations for bad ones, which continually hamper us in
dealing with older people. "Nothing is too good for the
child." This principle is more and more inspiring our
secular education : and the Church must see that it does
not lag behind or choose a lower way.

On this note our book may fitly close. Its main purpose
has been to show how Newman's dream for the Church
of England almost exactly a century ago of "a gradual
drifting of precious things upon her shores, now one and
now another, out of which she may complete her rosary
and enrich her beads" 323 has been in large measure
fulfilled in that sphere of hymnody which he had in mind.
True, these "precious things" are mingled with not a
little that is inferior or even worthless. Yet they are ours,
and they come to us from every age of the Christian past.
It is for us to treasure them and to give them in our
worship that place of honour which is their due. We
cannot hope to keep them entirely free from admixture
with baser elements : for there are many to whom it is not
always given to appreciate their true worth, and the

268

SOME PRACTICAL COUNSELS

spiritual needs of these may require a different satis-
faction. In striving, too, as we must, to make them more
widely valued we shall have to contend with all the mani-
fold influences that incessantly debauch the public taste.
Yet that, after all, is only the handicap which besets the
whole work of popular education. We must simply do the
best we can.

269

NOTES

The following abbreviations are used :

JDH Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (revised ed.), 1907.

FHAM Frere, Historical Edition of Hymns Ancient and Modern, 1909.

HDRE Hastings' Dictionary of Religion and Ethics.

LDAGL Diclionnaire de YArchlologie chritienne et de la Liturgie, art. 'Hvmne',

by Dom Leclercq, in vol. vi (pt. 2), pp. 2826 ff.
PHEG Pitra, Hymnalogie de I'Eglise grecque, 1867.
NCH Neale, Collected Hymns, Sequences and Carols, 1914.
WELH Walpole, Early Latin Hymns, 1922.
AH Analecla Hymnica (ed. Dreves and Blume), vols. I-LV.

RCLP Raby, Christian Latin Poetry, 1927.
BAILH Bernard and Atkinson, The Irish Liber Hymnorum (Henry

Bradshaw Society), 1897-8.
OBMV Oxford Book of Mediaeval Verse, 1928.
SH Selborne, Hymns, 1892 (a reprint, with additions, of art. in

Encyclopaedia Britannica, gth ed., 1881).
BEH Benson, The English Hymn, 1915.
DSPD Dearmer, Songs of Praise Discussed, 1933.

1 Hallam, Lord Tennyson,
Tennyson : a Memoir ii. 401.

2 Augustine, En. in ps. 148, 17
(P.L. xxxvii. 1947).

3 Church, Discipline of the Chris-
tian Character 53.

4 Introd. to Hymns of the Eastern
Church (1862) in NCH, 219.

5 FHAM ix.

6 Procter and Frere, Hist, of
B.C.P. 312.

7 See Wagner, Hist, of Plain
Chant (Eng. tr.) 14 ff.

8 SH6.

9 Burn, art. 'Hymns' in Hast-
ings, Diet, of the Apostolic Church i.
590.

10 Art. 'Didache' in Enc. Brit.

11 LDACL 2837.

12 Justin M. i Apol. 67.

13 LDACL 2832.

14 Duchesne, Christian Worship
(Eng. tr.) 50.

16 LDACL 2835.

16 PHEG 34 ff.

17 Cabrol, Liturgical Prayer, its
History and Spirit (Eng. tr.) 43.

18 A. Baumstark, art. 'Hymns
(Greek Christian)' in HDRE vii. 5.

19 See Batiffol, Histoire du brtvi-
aire remain 9 f.

20 Tertullian, Apol. 39.

21 Eusebius, H.E. v. 28.

22 Ib. vii. 24.

23 Pliny, Epp. x. 96.

24 Duchesne, Cuvette defontaineet
jambage d'autel in De la Blanchere,
Collection du musee Alaoui, fasc.
i, p. 49, n. i, quoted LDACL
2538. Cabrol, too, inclines to this
view, op. cit. 102.

25 Tertullian, De came Christi,
xvii. xx, (P.L. ii. 781, 786.)

28 Irenaeus, Adv. haer. I. xv. 6.

27 Eus. H.E. vii. 30.

28 Rendell Harris, Odes and
Psalms of Solomon, 1909, 2nd ed.
1911 : re-edited 1916-20.

271

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

29 Bernard, Odes of Solomon 42.

30 See Leclercq, art. 'Odes de
Salomon' in DACL xii. 1903 ff.

31 Basil, De Spir. Santto xxix.
73 (P.G. xxxii. 205).

3 2 Ap. Con. vii. 48, LDACL 2847.

33 Cabrol, op. cit. 102,

34 Procler and Frere, op. cit. 462.

35 Duchesne, op. cit. 83.

36 PHEG 37.

87 Eng. tr. in Ante-Nicene Chris-
tian Library iv. 343, Another tr.
'Shepherd of tender youth' has
found a place in various hymnals.

38 LDACL 2853 f. Baumstark,
HDRE vii. 6.

39 LDAGL 2850 f. Baumstark,
HDRE vii. 6.

40 The tradition in the Liber
Pontificalis (i. 129) that it was
introduced by Pope Telesphorus
early in the second century, being
said by the Pope on Christmas
Eve, need not be taken seriously.

41 JDH 1 109 f.

43 Wagner, op. cit. 39, with
references to H. Gramme, Der
Strophenbau in den Gedkhten Ephrams
des Syrers, and W. Meyer, Anfang
und Ursprung der Lat. und Griech.
rythmischen Dichtung.

43 Duchesne, Hist, of the Ancient
Church (Eng. tr.) ii. 137.

44 Aug. Con/, ix. 7.

45 Hefele-Leclercq, Histoire des
Candles vol. i. pt. 2, p. 1025.

46 LDACL 2867.

47 Socrates, H.E. vi. 8.

48 See Elizabeth Barrett Brown-
ing's essay, "The Greek Christian
Poets", in her ColMed Works

(1897) 597 ff

49 Gibbon, Decline and Fall (ed.
Bury) ii. 324.

50 E. B. Browning, op. cit. 602 ff.
See also Glover, Life and Letters in
the fourth cent. (ch. xiv.) 320 ff.

51 PHEG 21.

52 See Wagner, as above.

53 S. Petrides, Notes d'hymno-
graphie byzantine in Byzantinische
Zeitschrift, 1904, xiii. 421-3,
quoted LDACL 2874.

54 PHEG 42 ff.

BS JDH 460. Baumstark, HDRE
vii. 9.

56 JDH 460.

57 Baumstark, HDRE vii. 8.
See also LDACL 2879 f.

88 PHEG 48, 51.

59 Analecla sacra etc.

60 Crist, Anthologia graeca carmi-
num christianorum (1871) LI. f.

61 LDACL 2882.

62 NCH 220.

63 PHEG 10 ff.

64 LDACL 2878.

65 PHEG 47 f.

68 By Littledale, Offices of the
H.E. Church 197 metrical form
by W. C. Dix. JDH 976.

67 First published in Hymns of
the Eastern Church (1862), reprinted
in NCH 223 ff.

68 Ib. 222.

69 Baumstark, HDRE vii. 10.

70 On these see H. Leigh Ben-
nett in JDH 464 f.

71 FHAM 27.
7 2 JDH 606 f.

73 Ib. 465.

74 NCH 219.

75 Baumstark, HDRE vii. ii.

76 By H. L. Bennett in JDH
465 f.

77 Isidore, De of. Eccl. i. 6 (P.L.
Ixxxiii. 743).

78 Printed in P.L. x. 551.

79 Jerome, De vir. illustr. c.

80 Aug. Conf. ix. 6, 7 (tr. Bigg).

81 See Jerome's statement in
Praef. in Gal. bk. ii., 'Gallos in
hymnorum carmine indociles'
(P.L. xxvi. 355).

82 Mansi, Concilia ix. 778 ; viii.
330 ; ix. 803 ; x. 623 : also Batiffol,
op. cit. 208 f.

83 See Burn, The Hymn TeDeum
and its author, and the same
writer's Niceta of Remesiana ; W.
Douglas, Church Music in History
and Practice, isBf.

84 See Dr. A. J. Mason's art.
'The first Christian poet' in J. of
Theol. Studies, April, 1904, and
another by A. S. Walpole, 'Hymns
attributed to Hilary of Poitiers',
ib. July, 1905. See also art.
'Hilaire (saint)', by X. le Bachelet
in Vacant, Diclionnaire de Thtologie
catholique, and Dreves in AH. L. i-
9-

272

NOTES

8 s See WELH i ff. : also BAILH
i. 36 ff., ii. 125 ff. and Warren,
Antiphonary of Bangor (H.B.S.) ii.
36 ff. Gaselee in OBMV says : 'I
query the ascription to St. Hilary
only because the great name of
William Meyer is against it,' 205.

86 FHAM xii.
8 'JDH 44 2.

88 Duchesne, Christian Worship,
32-

89 Ambrose, Sermo c. Auxentium

34-

90 Isidore, De off. Eccl. i. 6.

91 Trench, Sacred Latin Poetry 86.

92 The subject was -first criti-
cally examined by Dr. L. Biraghi
in Inni sinceri e carmi di San? Am-
brogio (1862). His canons and con-
clusions have been accepted by
Dreves, Blume and A. Steier, and
in England by WELH 21 ff. and
FHAM xii. f.

93 Aug.fle*roS.i.ai.WELHa7f.

94 Aug. De beata vita 35, Con/,
ix. 12, WELH 44 f.

95 Aug. De not. et grat. 63,
WELH 39 f.

9 fl See WELH 50 f.

97 -ft. 35 f-

98 Ib. 62 f.

99 Ib. 104 f.

100 Of these hymns WELH be-
lieves that Ambrose wrote (i), (2),
(3) and "inclines to believe" that
he wrote (4), 25 f, io8f, 112.

101 RCLP 34.

102 Gastoue", V Eglise et la
musique, 125.

103 Dreves, art. 'Hymns (Latin
Christian)' in HDRE vii. 16.

104 Trench, o/>. cit. ^ ff.

105 Ib. 1 6 if.

106 Ibid. 26 ff.

107 Guest, History of English
Rhythms i. 116.

IBS Bigg, Wayside Sketches in
Eccl. History 21.

109 On this see Chesterton, St.
Francis, 26, 37.

110 Glover, Life and Letters in the
fourth cent. (ch. xi.) 253, 275. On
Prudentius see also Bigg, op. cit.
i ff. ; Gaston Boissier, La fin du
paganisms ii. 123 ff. : RCLP 44 ff. ;
Dreves in HDRE vii. 1 7 ; and art.

by Dr. Nairne in Ch. Quarterly R.,
July, 1928. The Cathemerinon was
published in the "Temple Classics"
series (1905) with a verse tr. and
commentary by Dr. R. M. Pope.

111 Glover, as above, 277.

112 WELH 123 ff.

113 Ib. 126.

114 Ib. igof.

115 Ib. ii7f.

116 Ib. iigf.

117 Ib. 121 f.

118 Ib. iggff.

119 Ib. 149 ff.

120 Ib. ix. He gives one example,
lam Christus ascendit polum.

121 This seems to be much more
than doubtful. But an Elpis may
have written thehymn,WELH 395.

122 \Yaddell, Mediaeval Latin
Lyrics, 300 f. On Fortunatus see also
RCLP 86 ff. and Tardi, Fortunat.

123 Trench, op. cit. 129.

124 RCLP 94.

125 WELH 173 ff.

126 Blount, Compleat Office of the
Holy Week (1687) 224 f.

127 WELH 165 ff.

128 74. i78f.

129 "Yhls poem is the longest of
several poetical epistles addressed
to Felix, Bishop of Nantes. The
first 54 lines are printed in WELH
182 ff. Complete text in AH. L.
76 f., with much information as
to the use of various centos.

130 See WELH 198 ff. and
Dreves, Hymnologischen Studien #1
Yen. Fort., etc., 6f: but also
RCLP 92 n.

131 Dreves in HDRE vii. 18.

132 So N. J. D. White, St.
Patrick, His Writings and Life 62,
BAILH ii. 208. But Kuno Meyer
in a note appended to his tr. of the
Lorica ('The Deer's Cry') in
Ancient Irish Poetry (25 ff.) says,
"The hymn in the form in which
it has come down to us cannot be
earlier than the eighth century"
(p. 112).

133 Orig. text BAILH i. 133,
tr. ii. 49 f. See also 208 f. The tr.
in the text is from Whitley Stokes,
Tripartite Life of St. Patrick (Rolls
series) 381.

273

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

134 Printed in Wright, Writings
of St. Patrick (1889) 94.

136 Ed. by F. L. Warren for
Henry Bradshaw Soc. Antiphonary
qfBangor, 2 vols. 1893-5.

138 Ib. 11. 10 (text), 44 ff. (note).
See also WELH 344.

137 Tr. by Whitley Stokes, op.
tit. ii. 397.

138 Text in BAILH i. 66;
OBMV 25 ff. 209.

139 Adamnan, Vita S. Columbae
ii. 9, iii. 23.

140 FHAM xiii. ff.

141 Blume's view with the evi-
dence was first set out in Der
Cursus S. Benedicli, Nursini und die
liturgischen Hymnen des 6-9 jfahr-
hunderts . . . (Hymnologische
Beitrage, 3er Band) Leipzig. He
also summarized it in his introd.
to AH. LI. The learned Belgian
BenedidBne Dom U. Berliere
accepted it on its appearance
(Revue Benedlttine, July, 1908) :
also A. S. Walpole (J.T.S. Oct.
1908 and introd. to WELH xi. ff.).
Walpole says that "it is now gene-
rally accepted by scholars". See,
however, RLCP 38 f. and 124 n.

142 WELH 258 f.

us These hymns appear in 3
only of 5 MSS. and are therefore
presumably later additions.

" 4 WELH 349 f., 356 f.

145 Ib. 298.

146 Ib. 1 08 ff.

147 See ib. 260-91.

148 The Latin titles are Martyr
Dei, Rex gloriose (384), Aeterna
Christi (104), Jesu corona (112),
Sanflorum mentis, Virginis proles and
Summe confessor (Numbers in
brackets indicate page on which
hymn appears in WELH). The
last is not in E.H., as having failed
to survive into Sarum Use.

149 Orig. text in BAILH i.
62 f. (B), tr. ii. 23 f (B).

150 WELH 264, 276.

151 Gabrol, op. cit. 99.
182 FHAM 120.

153 WELH 316 ff.

154 Walpole dates it Vlth to
Vlllth centuries, ib. 377.

155 FHAM xxiv.

156 Dreves in HDRE vii. 18.
See also Batiffol, op. cit. 209 f.

157 On Paul the Deacon see
RLGP 163 f, Waddell op. cit. 311.

168 On Hrabanus see RGLP
1 79 f, Waddell 3 14.

169 Dreves in AH. L. 207.

160 Ib. L. 1 93 ; also Dreves, Hym-
nologischen Studien 123 ff. But see
RGLP 183 n.

161 FHAM 259.
162 RCLP258f.

183 The "Benedicline abbess of
the eleventh century" to whom it
has been attributed is a mere
myth. See art. by Reginald Vaux
in C. Q,. R. April, 1929 : also
OBMV 228.

164 On Theodulph see RGLP

171 f.

165 \v arren} Tfig Sarum Missal in

English i. 224.

166 On Abelard see RLCP
319 f.

167 FHAM 512.

168 Ed. H. G. Hoskier, 1929.
Neale's tr. of the Rhythm is printed
in extenso in NGH 203 ff.

170 FHAM 209.

171 AH. XLVIII.475.

172 On what follows see FHAM
xxviii. f. and Dr. Frere's more de-
tailed treatment in his Winchester
Troper (H.B.S.), introd. See also
Wagner, op. cit. 243 ff., 219 ff. ;
RGLP 210 ff. and Blume and
Bannister in AH. LIII. introd.

173 Gastoue, UEglise et la
musique 132.

174 FHAM xxix. ; also Frere in
Oxford History of Music, introd.
vol. I57ff. ; Hughes, Anglo-
French Sequelae^ introd.

175 See Werner, Mothers Se-
quenzen (1901).

176 On this see Chambers, The
Mediaeval Stage ii. 29 ff.

177 On Adam of St. Vidor see
RGLP 348 ff. and Blume and Ban-
nister, AH. LIV. introd.

178 Les Proses d'Adam de Saint
Viflor, Paris, 1900.

179 See RGLP 343.

180 Ib. 443 f.

181 FHAM 41 7.

274

NOTES

182 SeeRGLP405f.

183 JDH 1043 ff.

184 FHAM xxix.

185 See Leclercq's art. 'Litur-
gies neo-Gallicanes 1 in DAGL ix.
1636 ff.

186 FHAM xxvii.

187 Ib. 545.

188 See Moffatt, Handbook to the
Church Hymnary (1927) 149.

188 FHAM 59.

100 Ib. 76, DSPD 53 f.

191 Bridges in Collected Essays
xxi-xxvi. 53.

192 On German hymnody the
English reader may consult
Catherine Winkworth's charming
book, Christian Singers in Germany
(1869) ; the art. on 'Hymns
(Modern Christian) i. German',
by J. G. Crippen in HDRE vii.
28 f. : and that on 'German
Hymnody', by Dr. Philipp Schaff
in JDH 412 ff. On the earlier
period the chief authority is the
monumental work by Wacker-
nagel, Das deutsche Kirchenlied von
der dltesten %eit bis zu Anfang des
XVII Jahrhmderts, 5 vols. 1864-77.
On the tunes see J. Zahn, Die
Melodien der deutschen Evangelischen
Kirchenlieder, 6 vols. 1889-93 and
W. Baumker, Das Katholische
deutsche Kirchenlied in seinem Sing-
weisen, 4 vols. 1883-1911, for the
Lutheran and Catholic sides
respectively.

198 Johannes Diaconus, Vita
Gregorii M. ii. 7 (P.L. Ixxv. 91).

194 Meyers - Lexikon (Leipzig,
1928), art. 'Otfrid' ix. 191.

105 Winkworth, op. cit. 28.

196 DSPD 36.

197 See art. 'Bohemian Breth-
ren's Hymnody' in JDH 153 ff.

198 Ib. 156, 1247.

199 Letter 698 in Luther, Brief-
wechsel, bd. 3 (Weimar ed. 1933)
p. 220.

200 JDH 322 f.

201 Crippen in HDRE vii. 29.

202 FHAM Ixxi. 165.
a" 8 JDH 963.

20* Liddon, Life ofPusey i. 299.

2 s See JDH 454.

206 Canon Crum's paraphrase

of Isaiah Ix. in the Winchester Hymn
Supplement (4) is such an attempt
and deserves wider use.

207 Winkworth, op. cit. 202.

208 DSPD 82.

209 FHAM 1 75.

210 Ib. Ixxiv.

211 See Spitta, life of Bach iii.
logff.

212 FHAM 445.

213 Ib. Ixxiv.

214 Ib. 76 f.

215 On the history of the French
Psalter see art. 'Psalters (French)'
in JDH 932 ff.

216 See Douen, Clement Marol et
le Psautier huguenot (1878) and
articles on 'C. Marot and the
Huguenot Psalms' in Musical
Times, 1881.

' 21V Prothero, The Psalms in
Human Life 1 78 f.

218 Ib.

219 Calvin's First Psalter, ed.
Terry, 1932.

220 Quoted DSPD 391.

221 FHAM xliii.

222 For evidence see JDH 44..

223 FHAM xlvi.

224 Fuller, Church History of
Britain (Oxford ed. 1845) iv. 73.

226 Thomas Wilmot, Earl of
Rochester, Poems (ed. 1926) 106.

226 FHAM Iviii.

227 Ib. xl. See also an art. by Dr.
H?rereinMusicandLetters,]a.n, 1929.

228 Nicholson, Quires and Places
where they sing 132.

229 Overton, Life in the English
Church, 1660-1714, 186.

230 DSPD xiv.

231 Overton, op. cit. 186.

232 FHAM Ixxx.

233 j7 or examples see ib. Ixxxi.

234 See JDH 1022.

235 FHAM Ixv.

238 Bede, H. Eccl. bk. iv. ch. 24.

23 "William of Malmesbury,
Gesta Pontificum, bk. v. ch. 190
(Rolls Series ed.), 336.

238 Comper, Spiritual Songs from
English MSS. of XlVth to XVIth
centuries 213, 223 f.

239

240 JDH 442 f.

241 Cranmer, Works ii. 412.

275

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

242 Gee and Hardy, Documents 435.
243 JDH58off.

244 Walton, Lives, etc. (Libr. of
Eng. Classics) 221.
248 JDH 347, 1289, DSPD xv.

246 SH 164.

247 BEH 60.

248 Ib. 63.

249 Wood, Athenae Oxonienses
(ed. Bliss, 1829) iv. 86.

280 See JDH 61 7 ff., 1659.
251 Religio Medici, pt. 2, xii.

282 Letter by R. E. Balfour in
Church Times, Sept. 17, 1937.

283 DSPD 27 1.
254 Ib. 372.
258 JDH 716 f.

286 SH 172.

287 See BEH ch. iii. 108 ff.

288 Ib. 217.

359 Quoted ib. 109.

26 JDH 35 o.

261 Ib. 1236 ff.

362 DSPD xvi.

283 74.317.

264 Gillman, Evolution of the
English Hymn 209.

266 T. Wright, Life of Isaac
Watts 70.

266 MofFatt, op. cit. 192.

367 J. Wesley, Letters (Standard
ed.) iii. 226 f.

268 BEH 218.

269 See articles on 'Methodist
Hymns' and 'Wesley Family' in
JDH 726 f, i255ff; also BEH
ch. v. 219 if.

270 J. Wesley, Journal (Standard
ed. by Curnock) i. 475 f.

271 Ib. ii. 20.

272 74. ii. 70.

273 BEH 225.

274 Ib. 231.
278 JDH68i.

276 See Grove's Diet, of Music,
art. 'C. T. Carter' i. 571.

277 FHAM Ixxxix.

278 DSPD 254.

279 Chappell, Popular Music of
the Olden Time ii. 669.

280 DSPD 34.

281 BEH 247.

282 Ib. 257.

283 Ib. 263 ff.

284 Romaine, An Essay in
Psalmody (1775) 105.

288 FHAM 596.
286 BEH 336 ff.

28 7 L. Stephen, art. 'Cowper'
in DNB xii. 397.

288 Ib. 396. See also David
Cecil, The Stricken Deer 143.

289 BEH 340.

290 Johnson, Works (Oxford
1825) vol. ix. 221.

291 In his Directions to the Clergy
(1724).

2 , 92 JDH 59 6f.
283 FHAM xc.

294 Foundling Hymns (1809) 81.

295 BEH 351 f.

296 Quoted ib. 354.

297 DSPD 48.
288 BEH 438 f.
299 Ib. 498.

soo j Williams, Autobiography

37 n -

301 Ib. 36.

302 Chandler, Hymns of the
Primitive Church, preface, viii. f.

303 Newman, Apologia 303 ff.

304 In Christian Remembrancer
vol. xviii. 302 ff.

308 Neale, preface to Mediaeval
Hymns (2nd ed. 1862), reprinted
in NCH 5.

306 Ib. 217 f.

307 Christian Remembrancer, as
above, 334 f.

308 JDH 1287.

309 Bumpus, Eng. Cathedral
Music 513.

310 FHAM ciii.

Remains of Rev. H. F. Lyte

(1850) Ii. f.
312 n,,

Quoted DSPD 233 f.

313 FHAM 30.

314 The account that follows is
based on FHAM cv. ff.

315 BEH 510.

316 W. Davies and H. Grace,
Music and Worship 192 f.

317 Bridges, op. cit. 66 n.

318 FHAM ex.

319 Bridges, op. cit. 52 n.

320 Ian Hay, A Safety Match.

321 DSPD 195 f.

322 See J. Wesley's Preface
(1790), quoted JDH 221.

823 Newman, Hymni Ecclesiae
(1838) xii.

276

PART III
APPENDICES

APPENDIX A
A BRIEF NOTE ON HYMN-METRES

i. Iambic, An iambus consists of a short syllable followed by a long,

-^ , e.g. ad-ore.

The majority of English hymns are in iambic metre, which is also
that of the normal type of Latin Office Hymn. In the latter case the
metre is known as Iambic Dimeter and consists of 4 iambic feet in each
of the 4 lines of each stanza or verse :

E.g. Aet-er- | na Christ- | i mun- | er-a etc.

This metre corresponds to the English Long Measure (L^M.), which
consists of 4 iambic lines of 8 syllables each (8.8.8.8) :

E.g.

+^*

For why?

the LORD

our GOD

is good ;

His mer-

cy is

for ev-

-er sure ;

His truth

at all

times firm-

ly stood

And shall

from age

to age

en-dure.

E.g.

Through all

the chang-

ing scenes

In troub-

le and

in joy,

The prais-

es of

my GOD

My heart

and tongue

em-ploy.

When the quatrain is repeated twice in each verse we have Double
Long Measure (D.L.M.) as in 'The spacious firmament on high.'

In Common Measure (C.M.) the number of syllables in line i and
line 3 is again 8, but in line 2 and line 4 only 6 (8.6.8.6) :

of life,
shall still

When the quatrain is repeated we have Double Common Measure
(D.C.M.), as in 'How shall I sing Thy majesty ? '

In Short Measure (S.M.) the number of syllables in lines i, 2, 4 is 6,
and in line 3, 8 (6.6.8.6.) :

with men,

When the quatrain is repeated we have Double Short Measure
(D.S.M.), as in 'Crown Him with many crowns'.

N.B. In L.M., C.M. and S.M. alike a trochee ( --) is frequently
substituted for an iambus in the first foot of a line :

E.g. Glor-y I to Thee 1 iny GOD | this night
T 279

The LORD
Our life
To dwell
Their patt-

Who left
and peace
in low-
ern and

the heav'ns
to bring,
li- ness
their King.

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

2. Trochaic. A trochee is a long syllable followed by a short, ^,

e.g. might-y.

Some famous Latin hymns are written in the metre called Trochaic
Tetrameter, consisting of 8 trochaic feet in each line :

,g. Pan- ge
Sing, my

ling-
tongue,

ua
the

glor-i-
glor-ious

o- si
bat-tie,

proel-i-
sing the

um cert
last, the

-a- min-

is

dread af-

fray

The characteristic later Sequence metre (see p. go) is also trochaic :

E.g. Lau-da 1 Si-on 1 Sal-va- | tor-em

Many English hymns are in trochaic metre, the number of syllables
in a line and the number of lines varying. E.g. 'Jesu, meek and lowly'
(6.6.6.6), 'Rock of ages, cleft for me' (7.7.7.7. 7.7) and 'Love Divine,
all loves excelling' (8.7.8.7).

3. It is impossible here to give a detailed account of the less usual
metres employed. We confine ourselves to illustrating some of the
terms used in the text of this book.

(a) "Feet." An anapaest is ^ "" , a dactyl ^ ^-, a spondee

(b) Metres. The metre of a number of hymns is anapaestic :

E.g. Im-mor- | tal, in-vis- | i-ble, GOD | on-ly wise

In Elegiacs a hexameter is alternated with a pentameter, i.e. a line
of 6 "feet" with a line of 5 "feet". These "feet" are either dactyls or
spondees, in accordance with certain rules :

E.g. Strong in thy | fer-tile ar- | ray 1 1 O | tree of | sweet-ness and)
glo-ry,

Bearing such | new-found | fruit 1 1 mid the green | wreaths of
Thy | boughs

In Sapphics 3 long lines are followed by a short :

E.g. Ah, holy Jesu j | how hast Thou offended,

That man to judge Thee 1 1 hath in hate pretended ?
By foes derided, 1 1 by Thine own rejected,
O most afflicted.

280

APPENDIX B

p*

OH

C] rVI t <3 "" C T) T) "0 T3 T3 T3 "O 13 "O T3 T3 "O

M I" 1 -! W ^! -H 3^3 .. rt .rt.n..rt . rt . M ... .

ri *^^ i TO n -M

. . i^ ^! 1) H 'r* M

*"" V -i i*H rfl +3 CG,

Q pL^ *-* , -M

H _ ^^ i ^ C

C ,Q . ^~^

'_, S o2 .saia^IS

< 3 a : N^^fe,^ ^ >

> .,"zr -sSo52.fi ^S-'^2 V " c
^ M | -ss -S,Qf8 sglH r

3*3 ^ 8?Bal 1-8^'i 3

" rS "6-!:)^'" oSS-S'ad S

S> ^ ^S ll^S 8 ^ 51 &1 I

2 a . M" SSfe u saaSn M
'S&S ^S O S^aj

" B |4 slips'-

||H 1

g ^rtrttS

Cfl

ci^S S

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

a
6

I

8 .

I

13 TJ T3

M

""'""'"' a

1?

1'

g

<rt

<tj 3
O M

.Jzi

w

*>

^/"^V-.^-s'-N CO O

U n)

!2 o !3 "^) "*2 ^^ ' ^

2

^ s C

^! t*H ^ t"*1 *~? ^ C^

C -0

^ ^ 3

^O *^ > ,^- v_^*r* ^ ^~*

3

L^ ,^ Q

SEASONS continued

Primo dierum omnium (
Somno refeclus artubus (
Censors paterni luminis
Rerum creator optime (i
Nox atra rerum contigit
Tu Trinitatis Unitas (F)
Summae Deus dementi

* Aeterne rerum conditor i

"w ^^ n

g i?

r" ' I)

32

^'^8
2 g

g-|-|t3

^,5.|S
*

$^"
ii.rt-g,

'&)._
3"u B

Iljl

fn

O

"w"

11 -3

o !~ 3

J S2'dg.^o g i C.., S-gff t5

Christe qui lux e
Te lucis ante ter

u

.s

!

u

282

APPENDIX B

I

.s

I

A

>*i
w.s

g a
1 1

S. S3

si
Si

8.8

.3

>rS

sl

C! ^

sfi>

o 1 ^

vivimus (Terce
dum est (Sext
o numero (No
nis trahitur
mystico

il?

cK

q
o
tr
qu
e d

r
or

Dei fide
Meridie
Perfecto
Sic te
Ex m

!

o

s

bo

1
>

i-4

1
<

1/3

8

.5

s

s

o

1

I

PH +J

o S

i

W

v

Tl

S

283

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

I

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5

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<og>

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S&2 'wlS'S'SlS

FH I Ig <J -rt "I "-" "- 1

&

<U fcS*

hn 75

3

VI

.S3
o

O

tert

Ascension

i

a
2

I

13
S

284

APPENDIX B

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'3 ^-S

sa

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Sj

ti 2

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j

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1-. OT

o-d
o.S

:?

>

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

rK

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td ^' I* ^ -o^-tS ro ^ e'Ji ^.

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286

^sgosiia

o

APPENDIX C

o'io

a

4

i

CO

o
O

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|

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co
co

o
to

287

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

o

I?
w

CO

* * *

CO

*

m

(M

s
I

O fl <J

CO
CO

c

73

Y,

unii

u, satur
tuum
em . . .

RE

ne no e
obriis, Jes
peregisti
suis tand

I
j
e

B

RIS

Sole
Oppr
Opus

Nunc

288

APPENDIX D

ENGLISH HYMNS IN COMMON USE
BASED ON THE PSALMS

Ps. Title

23 The GOD of love my shep-
herd is
The Lord my pasture shall

prepare

The King of love my shep-
herd is
34 Through all the changing

scenes of life
42 As pants the hart for cooling

streams

51 Have mercy, Lord, on me
65 GOD of mercy, GOD of grace
84 How lovely are Thy dwell-
ings fair
O GOD of hosts, the mighty

Lord
Pleasant are Thy courts

above
85-6 The Lord will come and not

be slow

86 To my humble supplication

go O GOD, our help in ages past

100 All people that on earth do

dwell

Before Jehovah's awful
throne

103 Praise, my soul, the King of

heaven

104 O worship the King

122 Pray that Jerusalem may 1472 $628

have

130 Out of the deep I call *250

136 Let us with a gladsome mind t53 a $ I2 J c f-

* 3 8i
139 O Lord, in me there lieth +605

naught

Thou, Lord, by strictest
search hast known

289

Reference

Author

t93 +653

G. Herbert

t49i $656

J. Addison

* I 97 t49 J^54

Sir H. W. Baker

*2go f 502 $677

Tate and Brady

*2 3 8 fsS? $449

!>

*2i8 t395 + 1 ?
$525

H. F. Lyte"
J. Milton

*2 37

Tate and Brady

*240 1469

H. F. Lyte

t492 $658

J. Milton

tgo $121
*i65 t45 $59^
*i66 {365 $443

J. Bryan (c. 1620)
I. Watts
W. Kethe

* 5 i6

I. Watts

*2g8 f47o $623

H. F. Lyte

*i67 1466 $618

Sir R. Grant

(based on W.

Kethe)
Scottish Psalter

(1650)

Sir H. W. Baker
J. Milton

Sir Philip Sidney
Tate and Brady

HYMNODY PAST AND PRESENT

Ps. Title Reference Author

147 Hosanna ! music is divine {521 Christopher

Smart
(1722-71)

148 Praise the Lord, ye heavens *sg2 J535 +624 Foundling Col-

adore Him ledion (c.iSoi)

Praise the Lord of heaven f534 +4*4 T. B. Browne

(1805-74)
150 O praise ye the Lord *3o8 5351 Sir H. W. Baker

290

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Abelard, 84

Accentual versification, 36, 28, 32,

36, 54

Acclamations, 18, 25
Acrostic, 26, 36 f., 39, 45, 50
Adam of St. Victor, go, 209
Addison,J., 165, 174
Adeste fideles, 98
Able, J.R., 115
Akathistos, 37
Alcuin, 79 f.
Aldhelm, 148

Alexander, G. F., 66, 224, 267
Alford, H., 219
Alfred, King, 148
Alleluia dulce carmen, 73
Allison's Psalter, 137
Altar Hymnal, 227
Ambrose, 50 if., 69 ff., 166
Amherst papyrus, 25
Anatolius, 44

Andernach Gesangbuch, 122
Andrew of Crete, 41
Anglo-Genevan psalter, I33f.,

146

Anglo-Irish cycle, 70, 73
Antiphonary of Bangor, 66
Apocalypse, 15
Apostolic Constitutions, 23 f.
Arianism, 29
Arnold, J. H., 75, 238
" Association," 253, 268
Athanasius, 29
Attwood, T., 82
Auber, H., 220
Augustine, 2, 29, 47, 51, 155
Aurelian, 69
Austin, J., 161, 165, 174

Bach,J. S., 101, 104, 117, 215, 239
Baker, H. W., 221 ff.
Bardesanes, 28
Baring Gould, S., 226
Barley's Psalter, 136
Barnby.J., 225, 227

Barthelemon, F., 192

Barton, W., 159

Basil, 23

Baxter, R., 164

Bede, 78, 148

Benedict, 49, 51, 69

Benediftus, 13

Bernard of Morval (?), 85, 210

Besnault, S., 96

Beveridge, Bp., 142

Beza, T., 126

Bianco da Siena, 99

Bickersteth, E. H., 227

Blew, W.J., 220

Blount, W., 61

Blume, Fr., 69 ff.

Bohemian Brethren, 106, 118

Bonaventura, 86

Bourgeois, F., 127 f., 130 f., 232

Brady, N., 142 f.

Bray, Dr., 142

Breviary Hymn-cycles, 68 ff.

Bridges, M., 217

Bridges, R., 23, 81, 101, 128 f.,

145, 230, 237, 249
Bright, W., 224
Bronte, E., 6
Browne, T., 157, 162
Bunyan,J., 163
Byrom.J., 194

Caedmon, 148

Gaesarius, 51, 69

Calvin, 123 f., 127

Campbell, R., 213

Campion, T., 154

Canon, 39 ff.

Canterbury Hymnal, 71 f. ;

Psalter, 70

Carols, 86, 99, 104, 121, 150, 241
Caswall, E., 206
Gennick, J., 179, 185
Chandler, J., 201, 205
Charity-children, 192 f.
Charlemagne, 79 f., 102

291

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Chatfield, A. W.,3of.,2i4
Cherubic Hymn, 33
Chesterton, G. K., 238
Children's hymns, 167, 180, 195,

266

Choral Harmony, 215
Chorale Book, 215
Chrysostom, 29 f.
Church and School H. B., 267
" Church Tunes," 136 ff., 146 f.
Clarke, J., 14.5
Claudius, M., 120
Clausnitzer, T., 114
Clement of Alexandria, 25
Clement of Rome, 1 7
Cluniac Breviary, 94 f.
Coffin, C., 95
Collins, H., 217
Cologne Gesangbuch, 122
Columba, 67, 71
Contahia, 34 f.
Conyers, R., 187
Cooke, W., 220, 226
Copeland, W. J., 205
Corbeil, P. de, 96
Corpus Christi, 74, 91 f.
Cosin,J., 158
Cosmas, 41 f.
Cosyn's Psalter, 136
Cotterill, T., 112, 194 f.
Courteville, R., 144
Coverdale, Bp., 151
Cox, Bp. (R.), 132, 146
Cox, F. E., 214
Cranmer, Abp., 152
Croft, W., 144 f.
Grossman, S., 160
Criiger,J., 112, 115

Damon's Psalter, 136
Darwall, H., 164
De la Brunetiere, G., 95
Dearmer, P., 168, 182, 212, 243 f.,

266

Decius, N., 109 f.
Des Contes, J. B., 97
Didache, 16
Dies irae, 91 f.
Diognetus, Ep. to, 17
Divine Companion, 144
Doddridge, P., 170
Dodsworth, W., 205
Donne, J., 156
Dorotheus, 32
Douen, 127

Drese, A., 117
Dryden,J.,8i
Dykes, J. B., 222 f.

Early Christian hymns, 148".

Ellerton, J., 226

Elliott, C., 220

Elpis, 59

English Hymnal, 236 ff.

Ennodius, 59

Ephraem Syrus, 28

Ephymnion, 36

Este's Psalter, 136

Eucharistic Hymnal, 227

Eucharistic prayer, 16 f.

Euchologion, 39, 43

European Psalmist, 233

Eusebius, 20

Evangelical hymnody, 186 ff.

F.B.P., 155

Faber, F. W., 217

Filitz, F., 120

Fletcher, P., 157

Fortunatus, Venantius, 50, 59 ff.,

125

Foundery Collection, 177
Foundling Hospital Colleflion, 192
Francis, 55, 85 f.
Franck, J., 114

French " Church-melodies," 239
Frere, W. H., n, 50, 69 f., 92,

H7> 129, 132 f., i37> 139. 180,

215, 232, 234
Freylinghausen, J. A., 117
Fulbert, 82
Fuller, 134

Gascoigne, T., 154
Gauntlett, H. J., 220
Geistreiches Gesangbuch, 117
Gellert, C. F., 120
Genevan Psalter, 125 ff.
Gerhardt, P., 101, H3f.
German hymnody, 99 ff.
Germanus, 43
Gibbons, O., 157 f., 232
Gibson, Bp., 191
Gilding, E., 192
Gloria in excelsis, 21, 24, 27, 68,

no

Gnostic hymns, 21, 28
Goss,J., 215, 219

292

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Goudimel, C., 129
Greek Christian hymns, 14 ff.,
27 ff.

Pagan hymns, 13
Gregory of Nazianzus, 30, 32
Gregory the Great, 64, 67, 71, 102
Guiet, C., 95

Hallel, ii

Harmonia Sacra, 178, 180

Hart, A.. 146

Hassler, H. L., 114

Havergal, F, R., 225 ; W. H., 215

Haweis, T., 186

Haydn, F. J., 120 ; M., 120

Heber,R., ig6f.

Heermann, J., 112

Heilige Seelmlust, 122

Heirmos, 36 f., 39 f,

Herbert, G., 156, 165, 174

Heretical hymns, 21, 28 f.

Herrick, R., 157

Hilary, 47, 50

Hill, R., 195

Holland, H. S., 238

Holmes, O. W., 237

Hopkins, J., 130 f., 133, 144

Horologion, 39, 45

Hosmer, F. L., 237

Hour- services, 68

How, W. W., 225

Howard, S., 192

Hrabanus Maurus, 80

Huntingdon, Countess of, 183 ff.

Hupton, J., 210

Hymn, definition of, 2 ff.

Hymn-pra&ices, 263 ff.

Hymnal Companion, 227

Hymnal Noted, 84, 97, 121, 208 f.,

226

Hymnary, 226
Hymns, policy regarding, 249 ff. ;

choice of, 260 ff.
Hymns Ancient and Modern, 221 ff.,

229 ff.
Hypopsalma, 19

Iconoclasm, 34, 38, 40 ff.
Momela, 34, 43 f.
Irenaeus, 21

Irish hymnody (early), 65
Irons, W.J., 91, 213
Isidore of Seville, 47, 65

Jacopone da Todi, 86

Jerome, 47

Je$u dulcis memoria, 76, 82

John of Damascus, 31, 39 f., 41 f.

John the Deacon, 102

Johnson, S., 237

Joseph, G., 122

Joseph the Hymnographer, 44

Julian, Ditt. of Hymnology, 92, 249

Justin Martyr, 1 7, 20

Keach, B., 166
Keble, J., 198, 216, 221
Kelly, T.,J 95
Ken, T., 30, 161 f.
Kmdal H. B., 186
Kethe, W., 133 f., 146, 219
Kipling, R., 238
Knapp, W., 145
Knecht, J. H., 120
Knorr, C., 117
Kyrie eleison, 18, 27

La Feillee, 84

Lampe,J. F., 178

Langton, S., Abp., 91

Latin hymnody, 47 fF., 68 ff.

Lauda Sion, 91

Laudi Spirituali, 99

Laufenburg, H. von, 105

Lawes, H., 141

Le Tourneaux, N., 95

Leisen, 103

Leisentritt, 122

Leoni, 181

Liber Hymnorum, 66 f.

Litany, 18, 46

Littledale, R. F., 226

Lock Hospital Collection, 179, 187,

192

Loewen, A. von, 114
Logan, j., 170
Lorica, 65
Lowell, J. R., 237
Lowenstern, M. A. von, 112
Luther, M., 100, 107 f.
Lyra Davidica, 192
Lyte, H. F., 218, 253

Madan, M., 179, 187
Magnificat, 13
Maintzisch Gesangbuch, 97
Mant, R., 201

293

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Marckant,J., 153, 165

Marot, G., 125 f., 130

Mason, A. J., 33, 63, 232 ; Jack-
son, 213 ; John, 164

Menaea, 38

Mercer, W., 215

Methodist hymnody, 171 ff., 184,

Methodius, 19, 26, 35 ; 45

Metrical psalmody, tyranny of,
124, 153 f., i66f., 191, 199

Metrophanes, 45

Milman, H. H., 196 f.

Milton, J., 157

Mission-hymns, 250

Monk, W. H., 219, 221 f.

Monogenes, 34

Montgomery, J., 185, 194, 215

Moody and Sankey, 251, 254

Moorsom, R. M., 214

Moravians, 118, 1746., 1841".

More, H., 161

Murray, F. H., 220 f.

Neale, J. M., 5, 32, 35, 38 f., 41 ff.,

76, 83, 121, 206 ff.

Neander, J., 115

Neo-Gallican breviaries, 93 ff.

Nepos, 20

New Version, 142 ff., 191 f., 212

Newman, J. H., 202 f., 217, 268

Newton, J., i, 3 ff., 188 f.

Niceta of Remesiana, 49

Nicholson, S. H., 139, 178, 263 ff.

Nicolai, P., in

Norton, T., 133

Notker, 88 f.

Nunc dimittis, 13, 23, 128, 132

Oakeley, F., 98, 205

Octoechus, 38, 42

Ode, 39

Odes of Solomon, 22

Old Church Harmony, 215

Old Version, 129 ff., 153, 191, 212

Olivers, T., 179, 181, 188

Olney Hymns, i, 189 f., 217

Orton, J., 170

Otfrid, 102

Ouseley, F. A. G., 222

Oxford H. B., 241, 256

Oxford Movement, 198 ff.

Palmer, R., 237
Parakletike, 38

Paris Breviary, 94 f., 200 ff.

Parker, Abp., 140

Parry, C. H. H., 222, 230,
232

Paschal acclamations, 25, 27

Patrick, 65 f.

Paul, St., 3, 11,13 ff., 19, 20

Paul of Samosata, 21

Paul the Deacon, 79

Paulinus, 58

Pentecostarion, 25, 39, 45

Peoples Hymnal, 226

Perronet, E., 186

Pestel,T., 157

Petri, Theodoricus, 121

<Pcos lAapov, 23

Piae cantiones, 121

Pietism, 116 ff.

Pitra, Gdl.,25, 33, 35f.,45

Plainsong H. B., 234

Plainsong Hymn-Melodies and Se-
quences, 234

Playford, H., 144, 165 ; J., 138,
147, 158, 161

Pliny, 20

Praxis pietatis, 115

Prid,W., 155

Primers, 152, 159

Primitive Monastic Cycle, 69, 73

Upoaana, 37

Proses, 89

Prudentius, 56 f.

Prys's Psalter, 1 39

Psalm-tunes, method of perform-
ance, 139, 145, 171

Psalmi idiotid, igf., 23, 29

Psalms, Hebrew, 3, 1 1 f.

Psalmody, antiphonal, 12 ; re-
sponsorial, 12, 19

Psalters, Metrical : French-Swiss,
125 ff. ; English, 129 ff. ; Scot-
tish, 146 f.

Pusey, P., 112

Ravenscroft's Psalter, 137, 146 f.

Refrain, 18 f., 26, 28, 30, 36 f.

Rhyme, 54

Richard de Caistre, 150

Riley, T., 192

Ringwaldt, B., 112

Rinkart, M., 1 1 1

Rochester, Lord, 134

Rolle, R., 149

Romaine, 186

Roman Breviary, 93, 202

294

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Romanus,35,-37f.
Royal Injunctions (1559)) 132,
153

St. Gall, 82, 88, 102

St. Sabas, 41 f.

Salisbury H. B., 216, 220

Santtus, 24, 68, 121

Sandys, G., 141

Santeuil, de, G., 95 ; J. B., 95

Sarum Office-Hymns, 73 ff., 203,

232,234,236
Schemer, J., 116, 122
Schenck, H., 117
Schmolck, B., 118
Schulz,J. A. P., 120
SchutZjJ.J., 117
Sechnall,66f.
Sedulius, 59
Sequelae, 88
Sequence, 88 f.
Sergius, 37
Shakespeare, W., 154
Shaw, M., 238, 245 ; G., 238
Shirley, W., 186
Sidney, P., 154
Simphonia Sirenum, 97
" Sol-fa," origin of, 80
Songs of Praise, 161, 242 ff., 258
Songs o/Syon, 240 f.
Sophronius, 38
Spanish hymnody, 48, 56, 65, 74,

84

Spener, P., n6f.
Speratus, P., iogf.
Stabat mater, 86, 92
Stanford, G. V., 178, 225, 230,

232

Sternhold, T., 129, 133, 144
Stichera, 34, 43 f.
Stone, S. J., 224
Strasburg Psalter, 127, 132
Strong, T. B., 241
Studium, 41, 43 f.
Sullivan, A., 226
Syllabic structure of Eastern

hymns, 28, 36, 39
Synesius, 30 f.
Syriac hymnody, 28, 32

Tallis, T., i4of.
Tate, N., 142 f.
Tauler, J., 104

Te decet laus, 24, 27

Te Deum, 48 f.

Tennyson, i

Tersteegen, G., 118

Tertullian, 19, 21 ,

Theoctistus, 44

Theodore, 43

Theodulph, 80, 83

Theotokion, 39

Thomas a Kempis, 87

Thomas Aquinas, 74, 82, 92

Thomas of Celano, 91

Thring, G., 226

Tisserand, J., 87 f.

Toplady, A. M., 187

Tra&arian hymnody, 198 ff.

Translation of Latin hymns, 75 f.

Triodion, 38

Trisagion, 24, 27

Troparia, 32 ff., 39 ff.

Tropes, 87 f., 121

Tropologia, 34 ff.

Tunes Annext, 180

Tye, G., 136

Unitasfralrum, 106, 118

Vaughan, H., 157

Vaughan Williams, R., 64, 141,

163, 225, 238, 245
Veni Creator, 81 f., 152, 159
Veni santte Spirifus, 91 f., 98
Veni, veni, Emmanuel, 97
Vexilla Regis, 60
Vitlimae paschali, 89, 92
Victorian hymn-tunes, 120, 223,

229 f., 244, 253 f.

Walther, J., no

Watts, I., i, i66ff., 172, 184, 266

Webb, B., 208, 226

Webbe, S., 98

Weisse, M., 107, no

Welsh tunes, 239

Wesley, C., 2, i73ff., 225, 234,

258, 267

Wesley, J., 118, 161, 171 ff., 187
Wesley, S., sen., 143, 173 f. ; jun.,

173*"-
Wesley, S. (musician), 114, 215

295

INDEX OF SUBJECTS

Wesley, S. S., 224, 233 Wordsworth, G., 224. ; E., 108

White, G. C., 220 f. Wotton, H., 154.

Whitefield, G., 174, 183

Whittingham, W., 131, 135

Williams, I., 199 f. Tattendon Hymnal, 231, 237, 250

Winkworth, C., 103, 113, 214 f.

Wipo, 89

Wither, G., 157 Zinzendorf, N. L., Count, 117 f.,

Woodford, J. R., 92, 213 175

Woodward, G. R., 104, 121, 240 f. Zwingli, 123

296

INDEX OF HYMN-TITLES
[ENGLISH]

A great and mighty, 43
A living stream, 164
A safe stronghold, 108
Abide with me, 218, 252
Again the Lord s, 87
Ah, holy Jesu, 112
All creatures of, 86
All glory, laud, 83
All hail the power, 186
All my hope, 1 16
All people that, 133
All prophets hail, 81
All things bright, 224
Alleluia ! hearts, 224
Alleluia ! song, 73
Angels from, 185
And now, O Father, 224
Another year, 58
Around the throne, 210
Art thou weary, 45
As now the sun's, 96, 201
As pants the hart, 144
At the Gross, 86, 202
At the Lamb's, 213
Author of life, 178, 182
Ave Maria, 216
Awake, my soul, 162
Awake, our souls, 169

Be Thou my, 200

Before the ending, 70, 72

Behold, the Bridegroom, 45

Behold, the great, 157

Behold the sun, 158

Blessed are they, 96

Blessed city, 74

Blessed feasts, 92

Blessed Jesu, 118

Blest are the pure, 216

Blest Martyr, 58

Bread of the world, 129, 197

Bride of Christ, 96

Brief life is, 85

Bright the vision, 202
Brightest and, 197

Captains of the, 95
Children of the, 185
Christ hath a, 170
Christ is gone up, 210
Christ is our, 201
Christ, the fair, 81
Christ the Lord, 107, 215
Christ, who knows, 164
Christ, whose glory, 115, 177
Christ will gather, 118
Christian, dost thou, 41
Christian, seek not, 220
Christians, awake, 194
Christians, to the Paschal, 89
City of GOD, 237
City of Peace, 155
Come down, O Love, 99
Come, Holy Ghost, 81
Come, Holy Ghost, Creator, 81
Come, Holy Ghost, Eternal, 81
Come, Holy Ghost, our souls, 81,

159

Come, Holy Ghost, Who ever, 203
Gome, let us join, 169
Come, my soul, 190
Come, my Way, 156
Come, O Thou Traveller, 180
Come, pure hearts, 91, 213
Come rejoicing, 89
Come, see the, 196
Come sing, ye, 91, 213
Come, thou bright, 117
Come, Thou Holy, 91
Come, Thou Redeemer, 52, 69
Come ye , . . anthem, 116, 210
Come ye ... strain, 43
Come ye thankful, 220
Cometh sunshine, 114
Commit thou all, 114, 182
Conquering kings, 96, 201

2Q7

INDEX OF HYMN-TITLES

Creator of the earth, 51, 69 f.
Creator of the world, 96
Creator Spirit, 81
Crown Him, 217

Dearest Jesu, 114
Deck thyself, 1 14
Disposer supreme, 95, 200
Draw nigh, 66
Drop, drop, 157

Earth hath many, 58

Father, most high, 58, 72
Father of spirits, 58
Fierce was the, 44
Firmly I believe, 204
For all the Saints, 225
For all Thy Saints, 202
For ever with, 185
For thee, O dear, 85
From east to west, 59
From glory to glory, 33
From Greenland's, 197
From highest heaven, 127

Gentle Jesus, 180
Give me the wings, 169
Glorious things, 120, 190
Glory and honour, 83
Glory to Thee, 162, 264
GOD from on high, 95
GOD moves in, 190
GOD of all grace, 46
GOD of mercy, 219
GOD of our fathers, 238
GOD that madest, 197
Great GOD, what, 109, 112
Great Shepherd, 190

Hail, festal, 63
Hail, gladdening, 23, 214
Hail, glorious, 161
Hail the day, 177
Hail thee, festival, 63
Hail to the Lord's, 115, 185
Hark ! a thrilling, 206
Hark ! hark, my, 217
Hark, my soul, how, 161
Hark, my soul, it is, 191
Hark the glad, 1 70
Hark ! the herald, 177

Hark, the sound, 224
Have mercy, Lord, 144
He that is down, 163
He wants not friends, 164
He Who would, 163
Hearts at Christmas, 114
How are Thy servants, 165
How bright those, 169
How brightly, 1 1 1
How shall I sing, 164
How sweet the name, 190
How vain the cruel, 59
How wonderful is, 90

I bind unto, 66

I could not do, 225

If there be, 87

In days of old, 43

In royal robes, 91, 213

In the hour, 157

In the Lord's atoning, 86

Jerusalem, my happy, 154
Jerusalem on high, 160
Jerusalem the golden, 85
Jesu, grant me this, 97
Jesu, Lover, 177
Jesu, meek and, 217
Jesu, my Lord, 217
Jesu ! name all, 44
Jesu, our hope, 72
Jesu, the very, 76, 82, 206
Jesu, the Virgins', 52, 71
Jesu, the world's, 72
Jesus Christ is risen, 192
Jesus lives, 120, 214
Jesus shall reign, 1 69
Jesus, still lead, 117, 118
Jesus, these eyes, 237
Jesus, where'er, 191
Joy and triumph, 91, 128
Judge eternal, 238
Just as I am, 220

Kindly spring, 190
King of glory, 115, 156

Lead, kindly, 204
Let all mortal, 33
Let all the world, 156
Let hearts awaken, 72
Let our choirs, 45
Let saints on, 179

298

INDEX OF HYMN-TITLES

Let the round world, 202
Let thine example, 80
Let us with, 157
Lift up thyself, 31
Lift up your heads, 185
Light's abode, 87
Light's glittering, 70, 132
Lo ! from the desert, 96
Lo ! GOD is here, 119, 182
Lo ! golden light, 58, 71
Lo ! He comes, 1 78
Lo ! round the, 195
Lo ! the blest, 62
Lord, in this Thy, 200
Lord, in Thy name, 216
Lord, it belongs, 164
Lord Jesus, think, 31, 214
Lord of all being, 237
Lord of our life, 112
Lord, Thy word, 222
Lord, to our humble, 46
Love Divine, 1 78

Martyr of GOD, 71

Most glorious Lord, 154

My GOD, and is, 1 70

My GOD, I love Thee, 97, 206

My GOD, how, 217

My Lord, my Life, 1 70

My song is love, 161

My soul, there is, 157

Never weather-beaten, 1 54
New every morning, 216
No coward soul, 6
Now GOD be, 107
Now, my soul, 95
Now, my tongue, 92
Now thank we, in, 214
Now that the, 203

O Christ, Who art, 69 f., 206
O come, all ye, 98, 205
O come and mourn, 217
O come, O come, 97
O Faith of England, 127
O food of men, 97
O for a closer, 191
O for a thousand, 177
O gladsome Light, 23, 128
O glorious King, 71
O GOD of Bethel (Jacob), 170
O GOD of earth, 238

O GOD of hosts, 144

O GOD, our help, 5, 169

O GOD, our Maker, 149

O GOD, the joy, 96

O happy band, 45

O heavenly Jerusalem, 200

O help us, 197

O Holy Spirit, 96

O Jerusalem the, 84

O King enthroned, 45

O Lord, how joyful, 96

O Lord, in me, 154

O Lord, turn not, 1 53

O love, how deep, 87, 208

O Love, Who formedst, 116

O most merciful, 197

O Paradise, 217

O praise ye, 222

O sacred Head, 113

O Saviour, Lord, 72

O sinner, lift, no

O sons and, 87, 88

O Spirit of the, 185

O Splendour of, 52, 69 ff.

O Thou, before, 178

O Thou from Whom, 186

O Thou in all, 237

O Unity of, 45

O what the[ir] joy, 84

O Word Immortal, 34.

O Word of GOD, 95, 200

O worship the King, 219

Of the Father's, 57, 121

On Jordan's, 95, 201

Once in royal, 224

Once, only, 224

Once to every, 237

Our blest Redeemer, 220

Our Father's home, 87

Palms of glory, 185
Peace, perfect, 227
Pleasant are Thy, 219
Poor soul, the, 1 54
Praise, my soul, 219
Praise, O praise, 157
Praise, O Sion, 91
Praise the Lord ! ye, 192
Praise to the Holiest, 204
Praise to the Lord, 116, 215
Put thou thy, 114, 182

Receive, O Lord, 29
Rejoice ! The Lord, 178

299

INDEX OF HYMN-TITLES

Ride on, 197
Rock of ages, 187
Round me falls, 1 1 7

Safe home, 45
Saviour, again, 226
Saviour, and can it, 178
Saviour eternal, 89
See the destined, 202
Servant of GOD, 58, 72
Sing a song, 154
Sing Alleluia, 74
Sing, my tongue, 62
Sing praise to GOD, 117
Sing to GOD, 90
Sing we all, 82
Sing we triumphant, 78, 208
Sion's daughters, sons, 91
Soldiers who are, 96
Songs of praise, 185
Spring has now, 121
Stand up and, 185
Stars of the morning, 45
Sun of my soul, 216
Sweet flow'rets, 58
Sweet Saviour, in thy, 44
Sweet the moments, 186

Teach me, my GOD, 156

Ten thousand times, 220

The advent of our, 95

The Church's one, 224

The day is past, 44

The day of Resurrection, 39, 43

The day Thou gavest, 226

The duteous day, 105, 114

The earth, O Lord, 210

The eternal gifts, 52, 70, 71

The foe behind, 121

The GOD of Abraham, 181

The GOD of love my, 156

The GOD Whom earth, 64

The great forerunner, 79

The Head that, 196

The heavenly Child, 95, 201

The holy Son, 161

The hymn for, 79

The King of love, 222

The king, O GOD, 128

The Lamb's high, 70

The Lord and King, 44

The Lord is risen, 196

The Lord my pasture, 165

The Lord of heaven, 158

The Lord will come, 157

The merits of the, 71

The night is come, 157, 162

The Royal banners, 60

The Son of GOD goes, 197

The Son of Man from, 95

The spacious firmament, 165

The strain upraise, 89, 209

The strife is o'er, 97

The sun is sinking, 97

The voice that, 216

The winged herald, 58, 71

The Word of GOD, 92

The world is very, 85

Thee, O Christ, 81

Thee we adore, 92

Thee will I sing, 129

There is a book, 216

There is a fountain, 187, 191

There is a green hill, 224

There is a land, 169

This is the day, 169

They come, GOD'S, 213

Thou hallowed, 43

Thou hidden Love, 119, 182

Thou, Lord, by, 144

Thou, Lord, hast, 45

Thou wast, O GOD, 164

Through all the changing, 144

Through the day, 196

Thy Kingdom come ! on, 237

Thy way, not mine, 6

To GOD, enthroned, 89

To GOD with heart, 158

Turn back, O man, 135

Viftim Divine, 1 78
Virgin-born, we, 129, 197

Wake, O wake, 1 1 1
Welcome, morning, 63
We plough the, 120
We sing the praise, 196
What cause, 95
What star is this, 96
What sweet of life, 43
When at Thy footstool, 219
When all Thy mercies, 165
When GOD of old, 216
When I survey, 169
When our heads, 197
While shepherds, 143, 165
Who are these, like, 117, 214

300

INDEX OF HYMN-TITLES

Wilt Thou forgive, 156 Ye clouds and, 58, 71

With golden, 59 Ye holy angels, 164

With solemn faith, 1 78 Ye servants of the, 1 70

Ye watchers and, 122
Yesterday with, 91
Ye choirs of new, 82, 213 You that have spent, 154

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THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO